


Sex, Death and Plants or: "Four Seasons Total Landscaping"

by Miri1984



Category: Four Seasons Total Landscaping - Fandom, Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: AU, Fantasy Racism, IT'S THE AU YOU ALWAYS WANTED, M/M, Multi, OT3, Oral Sex, Queer Platonic Relationship (Vesseek and Grizzop), Queerphobia, Stalking, alternative universe: four seasons total landscaping, consent negotiations, harrassment, tags will update and change, tipsy sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:47:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 29,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27538576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: Well y'all knew THIS was gonna happen eventually.Oscar owns a sex shop. Zolf owns a funeral home. The lot between them has been empty for decades. ENTER GRIZZOP DRIK ACHT AMSTERDAM, AN ENTERPRISING LANDSCAPE ARTIST. You can probably guess the rest.
Relationships: Grizzop drik Acht Amsterdam/Oscar Wilde, Grizzop drik Acht Amsterdam/Vesseek, Grizzop drik Acht Amsterdam/Zolf Smith, Grizzop drik Acht Amsterdam/Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde, Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde
Comments: 288
Kudos: 147





	1. LEASED

The lot between them had been empty for gods knew how long, it just seemed like fate, really, that there would be a gap between sex and death. "It's our neutral ground," Oscar would joke, and Zolf would roll his eyes and pretend not to smile as he handed over misdelivered mail and tried not to look at the row of increasingly outrageously sized dildos Oscar arranged in his window.

He knew Oscar didn't do it to annoy him.

Well. He HOPED he didn't.

So they'd always just accepted that there would be a big empty lot between their two businesses, the "for rent" sign up and rusting in the humidity.

Until, one day, there was a sticker plastered over it. 

"LEASED."

Zolf saw it when he drove in to work on Monday morning and raised an eyebrow as he locked up the hearse, wondering if whoever was going to try to make something in the lot work even knew anything about the area. 

It was a big lot, with a faded and disused carpark out the back of what Zolf assumed used to be a Walmart, or some other kind of big supermarket. The kind that stocked five thousand packets of cheap bulk toilet paper and bargain bins full of clothes that wouldn’t fit anyone, shelves too high to reach and thick with dust.

He could vaguely remember his brother talking about when it had been occupied, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember what had been there. The space had just become “the lot between the sex shop and the crematorium” and there had been more than a few occasions when Zolf had had to go up to the chain gates and rattle them, flashlight glinting, shouting at the kids who thought it was fun to skate or fuck or do whatever they wanted to do in abandoned buildings there when Zolf was just trying to work.

It was spooky, according to the locals. Because of where it was. Because it was slap bang in the middle of the sex shop and the funeral home and of  _ course,  _ that meant it was haunted.

The simple truth of it was, though, that sex and death were the main businesses around here. The  _ only _ businesses, really, although he tried not to think about it too much. That way depression lay, and he was doing fine for himself, the old family business was bustling, especially nowadays.

_ Especially nowadays. _

He pushed that thought to the side. He wasn’t like that any more. He had a positive attitude and hope for the future, that was what his therapist kept telling him. It was important to maintain hope. To find  _ love in mundane things.  _

Azu was very very good at her job, but sometimes Zolf wished she’d use better terminology. He got the feeling behind it, and he knew she understood his particular attitudes, but…

It was time for work.

He squared his shoulders, and went inside.

Cel was in the cool room. They had two funerals this week already scheduled and given the current situation in the surrounding city he anticipated at least three more, and Cel was prepping this afternoon’s body. Zolf poked a head in and they looked up and smiled their customary bright, wide smile. Zolf could never quite understand how relentlessly positive a person Cel was, but that was because he was the polar opposite.

“‘Sup Zolf?” they said, tilting their head to the side with the missing ear.

He’d never managed to get up the courage to ask about that. Maybe one day.

“Did you see the lot next door was let?”

“Oh yes! I saw the folks who are moving in on Friday, actually, they came to check it out. Couple of goblins, I didn’t catch their name but I think they’re going to make it a landscaping business? Seems like a good fit for the area. I mean not for the area since we’re industrial mostly but you know, there’s that nice neighbourhood on the east side that’s got all those lovely big houses with grounds and there really isn’t a good place to cater for them out here and…”

“Landscaping?”

Cel didn’t mind being interrupted. Zolf had worked that out in their initial interview. Sometimes he didn’t bother, finding their endless stream of chatter relaxing and often very informative, but today he was restless, and wanted more information than vagaries.

“Yeah! They said there was a good amount of space and the parking lot is huge so it’ll be good for bulk customers. Seemed nice enough. Very efficient and fast! I think they’ll be good neighbours.”

Zolf felt a weird shift in his gut at that, thinking about the lot between the crematorium and Oscar’s… shop. 

It would be weird, not to be neighbours any longer. That’s what he put it down to. Maybe whoever these new landscapers were would end up getting the misdirected mail. Maybe  _ they’d  _ have to deal with Oscar’s unbridled enthusiasm, and Sasha’s dry acceptance, and the stupidly large amount of dick shaped paraphenalia, rather than Zolf.

“Good to know,” he said to Cel, then made his way back up to the office. He needed to check if there were any potential clients. Needed to go about his daily business.

Whatever was going on next door? That could wait.


	2. Womaniser Duo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop needs to introduce himself to his business neighbour.

It’s good business practice, to know your neighbours, and somehow for Grizzop it’s actually easier to go to the sex shop than the funeral home. Sex is easy. It’s something he’s familiar with and something he doesn’t have to think about as a looming spectre of his own mortality, so he’ll go to the sex shop first, and he’ll introduce himself and make nice with the neighbours and everything will be _fine._

He’d wondered about their opening hours, when he went next door at 9:30am, because logically a sex shop should have regular opening hours right? If folk wanted sex toys folk got them during business hours, the same way you did all your shopping. He knew that “A Wilde Ride’ had a website. He’d been there. For a bit. An hour. Or two. Maybe.

Any way he suspected most of the business the shop did was online but they DID still have a shop front and that meant when Grizzop pushed open the door at 9:30am on a Monday morning a bell went and someone noticed he was there.

Or at least, he assumed she noticed. It was a fairly small space, although airy in its set up, with two aisles as wide as they could be conveniently and easily accessible shelves. Grizzop, who had spent most of his life resigned to the fact that items stored on high shelves were simply not available to him without help, was interested to see two wheeled stepladders attached to the high shelves on either wall, like something out of a victorian library rather than a purveyor of sex toys. There was a high glass case at the rear of the store where the cash register was, and it took Grizzop a moment or two to realise that yes, there was someone sitting behind it. She melded into the shadows cast on the wall behind her so well that it was almost impossible to make her out.

“Errr… wotcher?” he said, coming inside hesitantly. “Are you Wilde?”

The woman poked her head around the magazine she was reading - Grizzop couldn’t be certain in the dim light but it looked like it was about _knives_ and raised an eyebrow. She had dark hair and dark eyes set in a pale, pointed face, and was chewing gum.

“Aight mate?” she said. Her voice was friendly enough, and she didn’t look like she was about to judge him. He supposed that was something you’d have to learn, working in a sex shop. Not to judge the customers. 

Not something he’d ever had to worry about in the landscaping business. Although to be utterly fair he did judge a lot of his customers, just not in public where they could see.

So maybe this woman was going to go out back and laugh her ass off that a goblin came into a dildo shop with dirt under his claws wearing work boots but he wasn’t going to overthink that. 

He didn’t have time.

“Are you Wilde?” he asked, instead, striding with what he hoped was confidence up to the counter. He didn’t exactly avoid looking at the shelves full of produce but the edge of a feather boa tickled one ear as he passed and he had to suppress a shudder.

The woman laughed. It was a nice sound. “Nah, mate. Oscar comes in later, likes his beauty sleep. You a supplier? Cos we’re not really looking to expand our…”

“No, I’m Grizzop. Grizzop drik acht Amsterdam - I’m moving in to the lot next door? We’re going to be… business neighbours I guess. Wanted to come in and introduce myself, you know how it goes.”

“Oh you’re gonna put yourself between Oscar and Zolf then?” the woman grinned, then realised she hadn’t introduced herself. “‘M Sasha. I just work here.”

“Oh. Well. Sorry. Uh. Do you know when Wilde will come in because…”

“Sasha, love of my life, ruler of my heart, the womaniser duos have _finally_ arrived and we have backorders for at least ten, these poor women need their orgasms and I need your postal expertise.”

Sasha raised an eyebrow and grinned again. It was a nice grin, Grizzop decided. It had layers to it. “You’re in luck, Mr drik acht Amsterdam.”

“Oh, it’s just…”

“Looks like Wilde’s here early today.”

The door behind the counter opened and the owner of the voice was revealed.

This was probably more in the ballpark for what Grizzop expected a sex shop worker to look like but he was still taken aback at the sheer height of the man - well over six feet, long hair swept into elegant curls, an obviously tailored shirt (again, the lighting was bad, but Grizzop could see a pattern of little feathered _quills_ all over it) rolled up to reveal elegant wrists and long fingered hands.

“Oh, terribly sorry, my good goblin, I was talking to my esteemed employee, did not realise we had a walk in customer this early." Eyes raked up and down Grizzop's form, and while Grizzop would usually take offense, in this case he actually felt like the man... _cared. "_ May I commend you on your enthusiasm for the business of pleasure at this early hour! What _can_ we offer you?”

Wilde's gaze made Grizzop feel momentarily overwhelmed at the force of it. The man was _so much,_ and it was _all at once._

“I…”

“Ease off boss,” Sasha said, and her tone did something else to Grizzop, made him relax. Who _were_ these people? “Not a customer. This is Grizzop, he’s taken the lot next door.”

“Oh, not a customer?” Wilde’s eyes _twinkled._ Grizzop was pretty fucking sure eyes didn’t _do_ that. “That’s a shame.” 

Part of the act dropped, though, and Wilde gave him a nod and a smile that was marginally less flamboyant. “Landscaping then?” he said.

“You knew about us?” Grizzop said.

Wilde waved a hand. “I make a point of keeping up with the local businesses. And I keep an eye on who is coming and going. It was noticeable when folk actually started showing up to look at next door, I will not lie, and I asked a few questions." Wilde leaned against the doorframe he'd come through, tilting his head and crossing his arms across his chest. "It’s a pleasure to meet you Grizzop, can I offer you tea?” He waved to the doorway behind him, and Grizzop, to his utter surprise, felt tempted to accept. There was something about this man, his manner, his… ease. His utter lack of judgement. 

It was soothing.

But Grizzop had work to do. “Nice of you, but I just wanted to let you know we’ll be opening up next week. Gonna have a thing? In the carpark? And you and the other businesses are invited if you want to come.” Grizzop fished a flyer out of his bag and slid it over the counter. “There’ll be canapes,” he added, although his tone was sullen. Vesseek had been… particular… about the canapes.

“Canapes!” Wilde’s delighted exclamation was matched by Sasha’s expression. 

“Good grub? I’m in,” she said, and gave Grizzop a thumbs up. 

“Oh. Okay good. Um. That’s great then, see you there? Or before then since we’re next door and stuff.”

Two faces beamed at him. There were very very few similarities between the faces, but the expressions still managed to ignite Grizzop’s fight or flight responses.

He fled.

At the doorway he heard Wilde hail him. “Mr Grizzop?” he said, and Grizzop turned back. 

“Yeah?”

Wilde smiled, and it was that more genuine smile again. “Don’t forget to drop into Mr Smith at the crematorium as well.”

“Oh, I was going to go there next,” Grizzop said.

“I don’t doubt it,” Wilde said. “But a heads up for him? Even if he seems grumpy? He’ll _love_ to come. Don’t let him put you off.”

Riiiigght.

So. 

There was something going on there as well. And he was going to have to be careful. “Thanks Mr Wilde,” Grizzop said.

“Please call me Oscar.”

Grizzop waved and ventured back out into the harsh sunlight. Once there, he took a deep breath of summer parched desert air, and sighed.

He’d always known this was going to be weird. He guessed he just had to adjust. 

Like he always did.

The astonishing snakewife did a beautiful illustration of Sasha sitting at the counter please go check them out on tumblr they are AMAZING: https://snakewife.tumblr.com/post/634830819168485376/theres-a-really-good-fic-by-miri-about-a-sex-shop


	3. Zoomies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MORE ART FROM STANLEY AT THE BOTTOM OF THE CHAPTER

The goblin left, a package of efficiency and a quite delightful shoulder to hip ratio, and Oscar tapped at his lips with one finger as he watched him go.

“Boss,” Sasha elbowed him in the hip. “Womaniser duos?”

Oscar blinked, came back to himself and looked down at his most valued employee, and grinned. “I’ll man the till for a while, dearest,” he said. “They’re out back and yes, the current postal crisis means you’ll need to get right on that, faster than I would on a glass knobbler.”

Sasha rolled her eyes “You really don’t have to do that with me, Oscar,” she said.

“I only do it out of love,” he said, flicking her ear. She snorted and grinned, scooching up to kiss his cheek before she slipped out the back, and Oscar allowed himself a brief moment of thanking whatever gods might be listening for her before taking her seat at the counter. He glanced down at the invite the goblin had pressed on him and raised an eyebrow. “Four Seasons Total Landscaping,” he murmured to himself. The smile that spread over his face was entirely involuntary and he pulled open one of the many drawers they had lined up behind the glass cabinet, wondering what he could do to pass his time here, discarding Sasha’s back catalogue of Knife Sex Weekly and pulling out the latest Harrison Campbell.

He knew for a fact Zolf didn’t have it yet, he was waiting for his personalised signed copy, and Oscar wanted to make sure he was well ahead in spoiler territory before his neighbour had time to know the twists and turns of plot.

Manning the till was its own particular brand of boredom this early in the morning. They didn’t stay open late at night, not like some of the more well known shops in the more risque parts of town, but Oscar liked having a store he could point people to, those folks who still felt the need for a personal touch when it came to their… personal touches. And the shop was on land that he’d bought himself, with money he’d earned through his own talents, and he was fiercely protective of it.

Which was why when he heard movement out front that wasn’t just the tingling of the bell singling a customer, he set aside the Campbell, and slid his hand into his pocket where there rested a rather sturdy (and quite illegal) set of brass knuckles, before slipping out from behind the counter and making his way outside.

The street upon which A Wilde Ride resided could hardly be called picturesque. It was largely industrial, but had, for a time, enjoyed an economic boom that had made shops like Oscar’s seem like not such a bad idea. They were close enough to residential areas for it to seem a reasonable proposition, and for a while there’d even been a few up market coffee shops and even an organic grocer. 

That was years ago now, though, and the short strip where Wilde Ride and Smith & Sons now resided, soon to be the home of Four Seasons Total Landscaping, was an oasis of businesses amidst taxi repair centres, warehouse storage and one textile factory. 

Oscar stepped out of the front door, prepared for vandals, or ghost hunters, or in his wildest, most private dreams, something esoteric and weird that required him to be impregnated in order to further its species. 

What he wasn’t prepared for was Howard Carter and a goblin in heelies.

Howard fucking Carter. He worked for Barret News - and his presence at any time meant bad things for Oscar, but the fact that he had his camera in one hand while he was trying to get said goblin to stop and talk to him or at least hold still for a photo made Oscar grin.

The goblin wasn’t Grizzop, they were soft where Grizzop was hard, their skin green rather than grey, and their work overalls were significantly more stylish than their partner’s.

“Could you just…” Howard was saying, as the goblin skated back and forth in front of him.

“Could I just what?” they asked, with the sort of grin Oscar thought he had patented.

“Stay _still_ I want to ask some questions and maybe take some pictures I’m the PRESS!”

“That is the loosest possible description of what you are that I have ever heard, Howard,” Oscar said.

“Oh great,” Howard said, not turning around as he was still trying to catch a view of the goblin who was zipping around the car park at a, quite frankly, alarming rate. “It’s you.”

“Who else were you expecting?” Oscar said, and gasped as the goblin jumped over a piece of debris in the car park, remarkably skillfully.

“Point taken,” Howard said.

Howard Carter was not a bad looking man, tall, lanky, even occasionally well dressed in that scruffy way some people managed, and Oscar knew rather intimately how well he deployed those looks when he was after a story. Faced with a heelie’d goblin, though, the man seemed to be utterly at a loss.

“Is he bothering you?” Oscar called to the goblin, who was still smoothly rolling back and forth in front of Howard.

“Absolutely yes he is!” the goblin called back and Howard turned to Oscar, spreading his hands. 

“Come on now, Oscar,” Howard said. “I’m just here for my _job._ Don’t be a…"

Oscar shoved one hand back into his pocket and had the satisfaction of seeing Howard take a step back. Howard knew what he kept in there. Howard wasn’t a complete idiot. “Piss off, Howie,” he said, and Howard made a face, but backed off.

It was only once he was in his van and gone that the goblin approached Oscar.

“Hey he was an asshole, hi who are you?”

Oscar grinned. “Oscar Wilde. I’m assuming you’re one of Grizzop’s colleagues?”

The goblin matched his grin and nodded, tilting their head and sticking out a hand. “Vesseek,” they said. “Uh. They/them. I’m assuming you’re okay with that since you’re the one who…” Vesseek waved a hand towards Oscar’s shop, and Oscar’s grin softened.

“Most certainly. Cater to and accepting of all genders, please let me know if I can help with any of your needs.”

Vesseek’s eyes glittered at that, and Oscar was utterly delighted. Grizzop was obviously the restrained member of _this_ team, and if he could get Vesseek on board perhaps he could make this transition better than he’d anticipated. “Can I offer you a muffin? Or a cup of tea? It’s quiet over at the ride and I…”

Vesseek shook their head. “Waiting for a delivery,” they said. “Gotta get this place sorted before Wednesday, but thank you for the offer, Grizz isn’t as easy going as me but he’ll like it if you are.”

It was very difficult to keep focus on Vesseek as they rolled back and forth in front of Oscar, but he could not lie, he was charmed and fascinated. “Well put me down as delighted to be your future neighbour,” Oscar said, and Vesseek turned the force of their smile on Oscar, and Oscar was momentarily stunned at how bright and beautiful it was.

“Good one, mate,” Vesseek said, and then looked over Oscar’s shoulder. “First truck’s here, you might want to get back to your… uh…” 

“My sex toys, yes. I should. They get restless without me.” Vesseek, to their credit, giggled. “It was a delight meeting you, Vesseek.”

The goblin waved as Oscar moved off, and Oscar started to believe this could actually be the start of something very good.

It was, he could admit to himself, about time.

**SOME MORE STANLEY ART TO GO WITH THIS CHAPTER MY LOVES:**

****

****


	4. Change Isn't Always Bad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop delivers an invite. Zolf is canon typical.

There were days when Zolf missed the navy.

Not many of them, he’d admit, but a few. Back in the early days before the accident, perhaps. After basic training. There were never any days he missed that. But there was something to be said about being out on the ocean in the sunlight with the wind in his hair rather than stuck in a badly air conditioned office with a load of paperwork.

Who knew that dying could generate so much fucking administration?

Well. He did. 

Smith & Sons didn’t have anything as uncouth as a bell on the door the way Wilde Ride did, but Zolf’s hearing was good and he heard the door open with enough time to get to his feet, gather his cane and get to reception before the goblin standing there gave in to his obvious fear and fled. 

It wasn’t uncommon, to be afraid in a funeral home. The sense of the dead was always close to the surface here, although Zolf was one hundred percent certain that despite death being his literal business, not a single soul had departed the mortal plane in this building.

Not even his parents.

Not even his brother.

“Hello?” Zolf said, gently. “Can I help you?” 

The goblin startled. “Uh… are you Zolf Smith?” he asked and Zolf nodded. “Oh good. Great. Here.” A flyer was thrust towards him and Zolf took it, gingerly. “Next door. Um. Yeah look sorry I’m Grizzop and I’m moving in next door - we’re starting up a landscaping business? You might have seen the…”

“Leased sign, yes I saw it this morning,” Zolf looked down at the flyer and tilted his head. It was, as far as these things go, very well designed with a garden motif and a small photo of two goblins in one corner. They were both grinning, and Zolf could recognise the left one as the goblin in front of him, although he wore a markedly different expression than the cheery grin in the photo.

“You’re having an opening party?” Zolf said. 

The goblin shifted from foot to foot. “Um yeah. And your friend Mr Wilde said you’d love to come and we’re going to have food and drinks and some of our old clients are going to come too. Kind of a welcome to the neighbourhood thing?”

Zolf opened his mouth to politely decline, then rewound the conversation a bit backwards. “You said Wilde said  _ I’d _ love to come?”

The goblin nodded. “Said to make sure you did, actually, I think he might think you might try not to. But it’s good for all of our businesses to…” the goblin - Grizzop - trailed off a bit there and looked around the room, realising too late what “good for business” meant for Zolf. 

Zolf hadn’t changed a lot in the time since he’d taken over. The walls had been painted a few times, the flower arrangements changed regularly, but it still looked the same as it had when he was a child. There was a waiting area with a big coffee table, neatly stacked pamphlets advertising grief counsellors, surrounded by softly padded armchairs. A couch, big enough to fit an entire family (minus one or two members).

His father had liked there to be music playing, but Zolf found it distracting and a little tacky - there was no accounting for taste when it came to that sort of thing, and particular tunes could be painful reminders of things best forgotten to the folk who came here. So it was quiet, the carpet thick enough to muffle footsteps, the walls subtly wallpapered to make sure there were very few echoes.

People talked softly, here, trod softly, moved gently. 

Zolf had the impression that “softly” wasn’t necessarily something to which Grizzop was accustomed. 

Not to say that the goblin’s presence here was unwelcome. There was an energy to him, a light and a life that reminded Zolf of Wilde, actually, although he couldn’t offhand think of two people who  _ looked _ more different.

“It’s all right,” Zolf said. “Grizzop was it?” 

“Yes.” 

Zolf carefully put the flyer into a pocket and nodded. “If Wilde says I should come I’ll come,” he said. 

“You two are friends then?”

“We’ve been neighbours for a long time,” Zolf said, and he saw one of the goblin’s ears twitch. “Yes. We’re friends. Does that surprise you?”

“I dunno. This isn’t a church, is it?” Zolf shook his head. “So there’s no reason you’d be against his… sort of stuff.”

“No reason at all,” Zolf agreed.

“Still feels a bit weird though,” Grizzop continued, with delightful frankness.

“You know what, yeah,” Zolf said, smiling more broadly now. “It does feel a bit weird.”

“Sorry if that was rude. Vesseek says sometimes I open my mouth and words fall out that should have stayed in.”

“I think you would get on very well with my coworker, Cel,” Zolf said.

“Oh yeah? Well they’re invited too, everyone who works here, if there’s more of you that is.”

“Cel loves meeting new people,” Zolf said. “I’ll be sure to let them know. Although it is just the two of us at the moment.”

“Not a busy time for you then?” Zolf raised an eyebrow, and he saw Grizzop flush deep green. “Yeah, that thing about my mouth and words, that’s what Vesseek meant.”

“It’s pretty constant work,” Zolf said. “But not many folk want to do it.”

Grizzop swallowed. “I get that. Yeah. Um. You’ve… uh… got a nice place here. It’s nice. And I’m sorry for bothering you if you’re… busy.”

“Thank you,” Zolf said. “I’ll look forward to seeing what you do with the lot next door, it’s been empty for too long.”

“I can hook you up with some good flower suppliers too,” Grizzop said. “I mean, if you’re interested?”

Zolf nodded, a little surprised. “It’s sometimes difficult to get exactly what our clients want, so that would be appreciated.”

“Right then. Um. Good meeting you Mr Smith. I’ll just…” Grizzop backed towards the door, and Zolf watched him go. 

“Thanks for the invite,” he said, and Grizzop fled.

Zolf chuckled to himself as he made his way back down to the basement. Cel had earbuds in and was humming under their breath as they finished dressing the corpse, the last of their prep work done. This was a burial in the city. Usually Zolf drove the hearse in but his prosthetic had been giving him trouble the last few days so Cel had volunteered.

“You still right to do the drive?” he asked them, after tapping their shoulder to get their attention.

They pulled an earbud out and nodded. “Got my suit upstairs. You really should see the doctor about your leg, Mr Smith, you don’t  _ have  _ to be in pain like this, there’s pills and physical therapy and…”

“It’s just phantom pains, Cel. Pills don’t do any good. If you don’t mind the driving it’ll pass soon enough.”

“You know I don’t mind,” they said kindly, eyes crinkling. Zolf glanced down at the body. An elderly man, dead of a heart attack, Cel had done good work. They didn’t get a whole lot of open casket work. Back when his parents had run the place his mother had done the prep work that Cel did. Zolf had never been allowed down there, then, and he couldn’t say he was upset about it.

“Thanks Cel,” he said, and fished in his pocket to pull out the flyer Grizzop had given him. “There’s gonna be a party, next door. Next week. You’re up for that, right?”

Cel’s eyes brightened and they took the flyer, making happy noises. “Oh  _ brilliant,”  _ Cel said. “Love a party. Do you think there’ll be dancing? I haven’t danced in ages. Should I ask Amelia to come? Or do you think it’s just invites for busines… no I shouldn’t ask Amelia I…”

Zolf held up a hand. “I got the impression Grizzop didn’t mind if we invited extras. But I’ll check for you about Amelia.” He patted Cel’s shoulder. The party probably wouldn’t be too bad. He’d endure some teasing from Wilde, catch up with Sasha, maybe make small talk with the goblins.

Grizzop had seemed like a nice sort. A good person. They weren't rare, he reminded himself, the sum total of sentients on this planet were, in general, good people, no matter how hard it was to remember that sometimes. 

The knot of worry that had been sitting in his chest since he saw the leased sign loosened a little bit as he made his way painfully back up to his paperwork. It would be fine. Change didn’t always have to be bad.

He needed to remember that.


	5. Setting Up Shop

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's crunch time for Grizzop and Vesseek, while Wilde is targeted.

There was so much to do, to get the shop ready. They had stock arriving throughout the week, shelving to put up in the low building where they would have the office and some of the more delicate and indoor plants. The Greenhouse would take the most time to construct, and Grizzop had to stop himself from hovering anxiously around the workers as it was assembled on the cleared section of carpark. 

The two casual staff he’d poached from Eva’s store in the city, Meerk and Sassraa, came in for a day each to help out at regular rates, which was a relief, and Eva dropped round two days before the opening party to check in on her favourite apprentice.

“You’re still not mad at us?” Vesseek couldn’t help but ask her. Eva had helped with this every step of the way, despite the fact that they were, in essence, setting up a rival to her business, even if it was on the other side of the city.

Eva grinned and ruffled Vesseek’s ears - something they didn’t tolerate from anyone aside from her and Grizzop. “Of course not,” she said. “You both deserve this, after all the hard work you’ve put in.”

“You’re coming to the party, right?” Vesseek asked.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” she said, then leaned down to give them both a hug.

It was the day before the party when Grizzop was going over the last load of potting mix, making sure it was properly stacked and priced, that the incident with Wilde’s shop occurred.

He hefted one of the bags onto his shoulder when he heard the sound of Vesseek yelling. Frowning, he put the bag down again a little too hard, wincing and hoping he hadn’t split it, and jogged lightly to the edge of the carpark closest to Wilde’s shop. Vesseek was there, ears flat and vibrating, hands on their hips.

“What is it?”

Vesseek looked back at him, then jerked their head towards the wall of Wilde’s shop.

It was painted deep pink - a colour Grizzop was pretty sure had been chosen with specific areas of anatomy (human anatomy, any way) in mind, but spread across it in an angry, livid, blue spray paint, were the letters p, e, r, v and what was the beginning of an e.

“Bold as fucking brass, middle of the day, some asshole’s graffiting the side of his shop,” Vesseek, normally not one to show anger, was rigid and furious. 

It wasn’t hard to imagine what the rest of the word was intending to be, and Grizzop frowned, wondering why they were even bothering with this kind of thing. It wasn’t a residential neighbourhood, Wilde did almost all of his business online, it didn’t make sense for puritans to be slathering graffiti over someone’s wall like this, where no one but a few grieving families and now, the odd person in search of some gardening services would see.

“Did you get a look at who did it?” A voice from behind them made Grizzop jump a bit, and he turned to see Zolf Smith, standing on the pavement leaning heavily on his cane.

He looked angry.

In the crematorium, when Grizzop had gone to invite him to the party, he’d seemed like a kindly old man, soft voiced and gentle - exactly the kind of person you’d expect to find in that artificially calming atmosphere. 

He’d been wrong. 

First off, he wasn’t actually old, the white hair, the cane, they’d fooled him into believing the dwarf was some sort of venerable sage-like being, dealing in death and grief because he’d been through it in only the way a true elder can. Out here, in the harsh desert sunlight Grizzop could see he was unlined and his face was actually youthful, his arms thick and corded with muscle and his hands where they gripped the head of his cane wide and strong. 

Secondly, those kind green eyes were thunderous now, white brows drawn down to shadow them in pure anger, and the voice, low and lilting with that odd accent, held the threat of violence. 

“Human,” Vesseek said, immediately. “Not a kid. They were wearing a hoodie though so I couldn’t get a look at their face.”

“In this heat?” Grizzop said, flicking an ear.

Zolf’s mouth was set in a hard line. “Exactly,” he said. 

“Do you wanna call the cops?” Vesseek asked, a little hesitantly. 

The short, sharp bark of a laugh that Zolf let out told Grizzop exactly how good an idea _that_ would be.

“No point,” Zolf said, confirming what Grizzop had suspected. Unease twisted in his gut. They’d scouted the area and looked into it very thoroughly before they’d decided to set up here, and there’d never been any indications that the crime rate was worse than where Eva’s business had been. 

“Is this sort of thing common here?” Grizzop asked. 

Zolf heaved a sigh. “No,” he said. “Well. Yeah. It’s… complicated.”

A few things slotted into place in Grizzop’s mind. “Someone has it in for the shop or someone has it in for Wilde?” Grizzop said, and Zolf raised an eyebrow at him.

“Not that complicated, then, it seems. Both. Probably. I mean, they don’t like Wilde but they’re the kind of folks who don’t like his work either.”

Grizzop felt his ears flatten, even as Vesseek gave a small growl of disapproval. “We’ll keep an eye out, then,” Grizzop said. 

Zolf’s expression softened somewhat, at that, and he nodded at Vesseek, who nodded back. “I’m Zolf Smith, from next door,” he said.

“Nice to meet you,” Vesseek said. “I’m…” 

“Vesseek, yeah. I recognise you from the flier.” Vesseek grinned and gave Zolf a thumbs up, the anger flowing away from them like water. Grizzop envied them the ability to so easily let go of negative emotions. Personally he still felt the greasy unease of fear in his gut, wondering what the person would have done after they’d finished their graffiti, wondering whether Wilde had been targeted in other, worse ways, for Zolf to look that angry about it happening again.

“I’d better go tell Wilde what’s happened.” Zolf said, and turned towards _A Wilde Ride_ , moving more briskly than Grizzop had thought him capable with his cane.

“Hey, uh… Mr Smith?” he called, and Zolf turned.

“Yeah?”

“Uh, tell him we’re sorry we couldn’t stop whoever it was,” he said.

Zolf gave him another smile, tinged with sadness. It was a nice smile, Grizzop thought. 

“I’ll let him know.”

“See you at the party tomorrow?” Vesseek called after Zolf as he turned away again, and the dwarf raised a hand in acknowledgement.

“Come on, ‘Seek,” Grizzop said. “If we’re going to _have_ this party we need to get a move on here.”

MORE AWESOME STANLEY ART


	6. Graphic Design is My Passion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zolf tries to get Oscar to admit he is in trouble. You can all guess how THAT goes.

Exchanging emails with the suppliers of sex toys was something of a joy to Oscar. There was something about being able to write an official, business email containing the words “there has been a delay on our scheduled delivery of the Sados Spiked Chamber Silicone Male Chastity Device, would you be so kind as to get back to me with the estimated new date of arrival” that sent a frisson of joy down his spine and he was smiling to himself as he tapped away at the computer behind the counter of A Wilde Ride when the bell went off.

He glanced at the time - only a bit past eleven - not unheard of for a walk in customer but still unusual - then at the doorway, where he could make out a short, familiar figure, the harsh light of day outside the dimly lit shop suffusing the pure whiteness of his hair and making him look something like an avenging angel.

Oscar heaved a deep sigh of satisfaction. There was always a good reason for Zolf to come visiting but he never failed to be grateful that the dwarf couldn’t open the damned door of the shop without pausing dramatically for effect. 

“Morning Zolf,” he said.

“Wilde,” Zolf stomped into the shop, his prosthetic hitting the soft carpet with a satisfying thump on each alternate step. “Something you need to see.”

Oscar raised an eyebrow at Zolf’s tone. He was nearly always serious, but there was an edge to it that Oscar wasn’t happy to be familiar with.

“Ah,” he said, getting up from behind the desk. There were only a few things that warranted that tone, and Oscar mentally shored himself up for what it would be this time. Another scathing article, perhaps? There hadn't been any backlash from the little altercation at with Vesseek next door, and Oscar had half been expecting something to show up in the local paper. Not that it would be too bad, all told, Carter did his best, but he wasn’t really up to the task of hitting where it hurt the most. All that dull academic training - it really got in the way of true gutter journalism.

Zolf led him outside and around to the side of A Wilde Ride, where Oscar saw the latest addition to his beautiful pink wall.

Hmmm. 

“Graphic design was _not_ this person’s passion, I see,” he murmured, taking in the shaky formation of the letters, the frankly _appalling_ choice of colour. “That blue does _not_ go with that pink at _all.”_

“Wilde,” Zolf said.

“And they’re not really big on imagination, are they? Perversion is the _least_ of my faults, I would have expected better from...”

_“Wilde.”_

Oscar glanced down to see Zolf giving him a very particular look. It was a good one, on him. Part exasperation part righteous indignation. Sometimes Oscar daydreamed of waking up to that look.

He sighed. _“Yes,_ Zolf,” he said. 

“It’s getting worse, isn’t it,” he said. 

Oscar waved a hand. “Eh.”

“Have you gotten any more letters?”

He was _almost_ certain he managed to hide the wince at the bluntness of that question. “Your concern for me is, as always, touching, Zolf, but I can take care of myself. Who discovered this, by the way?”

“Our new neighbours. Vesseek chased whoever it was off, which is why it isn’t finished and don’t deflect the question.”

"Our new neighbours are turning out to be utterly delightful. Did you see Vesseek gets around mostly on heelies? Never could master those myself although they look like so much fun..."

_"Letters, Wilde?"_

Oscar hissed in a breath, anger surging in his chest, before letting out that breath slowly, regaining equilibrium. “I can _handle_ this, Zolf.”

“I don’t think you _can,”_ Zolf said, and his voice did that delightful gruff thing it did when he was only just holding on to his temper and Oscar could drown in that voice and forget about the wall, the letters, the paper and Barret so easily but…

“They’re like children,” he said, dropping some of the flippancy from his tone. “Petulant, vindictive children. And sure they have a little bit more power than some, a little more resources, a little more time, but what they don’t have, what they’ll _never_ have from me, is fear.”

“You’re underestimating what they can do to you,” Zolf said, and there was grief in that that made Oscar's heart clench. He never forgot, no, that he wasn't the only person Barret had hurt, but Zolf was far, far less likely to be open about what _he_ had endured. 

Oscar spread his hands. “What more do I have to lose?”

Zolf shook his head. “Your shop?”

Oscar felt his shoulders slump a little. Zolf was like that. His relentless support could sometimes strike home at the kernel of fear that lay at the heart of his bravado. “They’ve been trying,” he said softly. “They’ve been trying for years.”

“It’s getting worse though, isn’t it?”

Oscar let his eyes fall back on the graffitied side of his shop, the letters blue and stark over the pink, and lifted and dropped his shoulders. “I should get the paint,” he said.

He felt a strong hand on his forearm. “You don’t have to do this on your own, you know.”

Oscar grinned down at him. “I’ll bring two brushes out.”

Zolf let out a string of swears that almost brought colour to Oscar’s cheeks. Sometimes he forgot Zolf had been years at sea. Sometimes he forgot that the crematorium had, when he’d first arrived here, been run by Zolf’s kind hearted, quiet spoken parents and not the complex, angry, irritating, _marvelous_ dwarf next to him now.

“I think there were two new ones you haven’t taught me in there,” Oscar said,

“Bring two fucking brushes out,” Zolf said. “I can help you with one thing, at the very least.”

“Sir, yessir,” Oscar said, backing off towards the shop. He kept spare paint in the back with the rest of his stock - being tagged was a fact of life for any shop owner, and he’d even helped Zolf paint over a few tags on the crematorium in his time. 

His eyes didn’t fall on the waste paper basket behind the counter as he made his way into the back room for the paint and the brushes, in it, still slightly smoking, the shredded remains of this morning’s letter.

He selected two brushes and the extra long roller for good measure, the paint and the tray, and headed back out into the sun.


	7. Taste Test

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vesseek is admiring, Grizzop is curious. Ed is Ed.

Ed Keystone was the best pastry chef this side of the city, by all accounts, at least that’s what his boss assured Grizzop when Vesseek was sorting out the menu for their grand opening, and sitting in his newly completed office on the morning of said party, Grizzop found himself wishing that Vesseek had hired someone a little less… a little less.

“He’s just so dreamy,” Vesseek was saying. “You’ve gotta come look at him working, Grizz, the arms on him… while he folds the dough I’m…”

“‘Seek we’re opening tomorrow, we’ve got a party tonight, I don’t have time to lust after random pastry chefs and neither do you.”

Vesseek pouted and draped themself over the countertop. The shop looked great, there was no denying that. Vesseek had arranged all their best plants such that when Grizzop had walked in this morning from the desert heat he’d felt like he was stepping into a woodland glade. Grizzop could imagine working  _ indoors  _ here, wonder of wonders, without going stircrazy with boredom and the longing to see the sky. Eva’s shopfront had been fine, but he’d always hated being stuck behind the counter there, like he was at some boring office job instead of out in the dirt with his plants under the sunshine, feeling the wind in his ears.

It wouldn’t be his job to be stuck here too often, thankfully. That’s what their casual staff were for after all, but he still had to do payroll and advertising and accounts and all the mundane and boring things that running a business entailed. Maybe he’d hire a business manager at some point - that way he’d be able to delegate all that stuff to them. But they didn’t have the money for that, yet, so Grizzop had to be content with having an office that was as outdoorsy as it was possible to get without having it open to the sky.

Wouldn’t be great for business if their computers all went down the first time it rained.

Vesseek was still loitering, under the pretense of checking the boston ferns for parasites. The problem was, they didn’t actually have a whole lot to do right now. Vesseek idling at the counter waxing lyrical about Ed Keystone wasn’t actually wasting time, since everything they could do they had done, and all Grizzop was really doing was being anxious.

Vesseek, of course, knew this, and knew that Grizzop knew that they knew this, and as a result was trying to get a rise out of him.

“Zolf and Oscar painted over the graffiti yesterday,” Vesseek said. 

“Oh it’s Zolf and Oscar for you now, is it?”

Vesseek shrugged. “They’re our neighbours and Oscar practically begged me to call him by his first name, and Zolf doesn’t seem to mind. What’s the deal with those two anyway, do you think?”

Grizzop looked up. “What do you mean?”

“Something’s definitely going on, yeah? The way Zolf was all…” Vesseek lifted up their hands and made a growly noise “about the graffiti, like someone had hurt his favourite puppy or something…”

“I got the impression they’ve been neighbours for a long time,” Grizzop said, although curiosity had been lurking in his gut same as it was obviously lurking in Vesseek’s. “I’d get angry if someone wrote nasty things about you, for example.”

Vesseek fluttered their eyelashes and Grizzop grinned at them. “My  _ hero,”  _ Vesseek said, flipping their ears so the rings in them jingled pleasantly. “Still seems weird. Have you looked up Oscar? He used to be a journalist! Worked with the Grits Herald, back before it got took over by the Rackets.”

“Huh. Seems like an odd career change for him.”

“He was  _ fired.” _

Grizzop flicked an ear, pursing his lips. “Before or after the paper changed hands?” Grizzop had no respect for Barret News, the fact that one of their reporters had been hanging around trying to get pictures and interviews with them since they’d signed the lease worried him. There were, after all, only so many concerned editorials about “the goblin problem” that he could take with a grain of salt.

“After,” Vesseek said, popping a piece of gum in their mouth. “Got the impression from how Oscar talked to that Carter guy that they knew each other pretty well too. My guess is something went  _ down.  _ Some sort of scandal or something.”

“If Barret Racket doesn’t like Oscar Wilde I will count that as a plus for Mr Wilde,” Grizzop said. 

“Me too,” Vesseek said. “And I mean, he can’t be all bad, if Zolf likes him, and he dresses  _ so well.  _ Can’t wait to see him at the party.”

Grizzop sighed and let Vesseek’s chatter wash over him, idly scrolling through the internet as his partner talked. His fingers hovered over the keys on the search engine, thinking about looking up the details around Oscar Wilde’s ejection from the world of print journalism, but instead he found his fingers typing  _ Zolf Smith  _ into the search bar.

It wasn’t a common name, and understandably the first thing to come up was the web site for the Crematorium. Tastefully and skillfully done, Grizzop noted, not surprisingly, considering the interior of the place itself. 

It was the second entry that had Grizzop flicking his ears in surprise. It was an old article - nearly twenty years old in fact - dealing with the death of one Feryn Smith. Zolf’s name had come up as the “brother of the deceased” but the article itself was a short stub of a thing discussion a traffic accident which had killed him - a nasty one by all accounts.

Zolf had been the driver. 

_ Oh,  _ Grizzop thought to himself. 

Aside from that, Zolf seemed to be digitally untraceable, a good trick in this day and age, although he did find one photograph of him in military uniform. Grizzop wasn’t much for the armed forces as a general rule, but to his untrained eye it looked like the navy. Zolf was blond in it, rather than white haired, hair clipped short, and beardless, and there was a haunted look in his eyes.

He’d run away to sea. Easy enough to imagine why, dealing with the guilt of his brother’s death, unable to face his parents. 

Something had eventually brought him back, his missing leg, presumably, and now he was in charge of the family business, worried about Oscar Wilde, and Grizzop’s neighbour.

There was a noise at the door and Grizzop looked up to see Ed Keystone standing nervously in it. The man had the proportions of some sort of god - wide shouldered and solid and his sleeves were rolled up to reveal forearms that Grizzop could hang off of without the man even noticing. His face was open and honest and beautiful, and he heard Vesseek, who had been idly flipping through a magazine next to him, let out an audible sigh.

“Mr Grizzop, sir?” Ed said.

“Yes Ed?” Grizzop said.

“Freidrich said you might want to try some of the canapes, make sure they’re up to standard?” Grizzop noticed that the man was holding a tray of said canapes, and the delicious smells that had been permeating the office from the pop up kitchen in the car park were much closer.

His stomach rumbled, and he smiled. “Thanks, Ed,” he said, and reached out to taste, putting the problem of his neighbours out of his mind for now.


	8. Mingling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zolf manages to be social.

He would be lying if he said that parties had never been his thing. Zolf had been in the navy, after all, and shore leave had included some fairly memorable nights (and several achingly hungover days afterwards) in bars along the coasts of various countries with his crewmates. He wasn’t sure, though, whether he’d ever really enjoyed himself at them. It’d taken him a few years of therapy to realise that, to realise that the way he’d behaved during those years had been a form of flight. The actual act of running away had only been the beginning of a self destructive spiral that had led to the loss of his leg and the end of his career. 

It had ended in reconciliation, he supposed, and a kind of peace. And a new life, or at least the old one repurposed.

In any case, he had little in the way of party clothing. His formal suits, the clothes he wore when he was meeting clients (or the families of clients) seemed a little too sombre for something that was supposed to be a celebration of a beginning, and his regular working clothing was hardly party appropriate.

Wilde had offered to take him shopping, but Zolf was a grown dwarf and he knew how to dress himself, so he’d managed an outing on his own to get the shirt and pants he was going to wear for the party. Still, seeing them laid out on his bed was something different.

It wasn’t that he was ashamed of his body, or that he was shy or even vain. It was just… different. 

He sighed. It was a shame, really, that the party was going to be mostly outdoors. He could have gotten away with a plain suit, but the temperature hadn’t dropped below eighty since April and it wasn’t likely to do it any time soon.

In any case, he’d settled on a light blue shirt and some linen pants. He’d braided his beard, slipped the ring that Feryn left him over the end to tie it in place. It wasn’t as though he was going to this party to advertise the crematorium. He was going to it to give support to Grizzop and Vesseek, to show that he was a good neighbour. He liked them. He did. They were good people and with the latest graffiti and the people Zolf  _ knew  _ were behind it, he wanted the two goblins to know that Zolf, at least, had their backs, the same as he had Wilde’s.

He picked up his cane and made his way to the car. This was going to be fine. 

Cel met him at the Crematorium. They were dressed elegantly, as they always managed, in a sleeveless top and loose pants that accentuated their lean height and angular features. Their hair, always a shock on their head, tonight was standing up in peaks, and their one remaining ear was adorned with piercings that hung and tinkled slightly when they moved. They were confined by regulations to only studs in those piercings during work hours, and Zolf had only ever seen them with the full array a few times when they’d gotten changed to go out after a shift. 

“You look great, Cel,” he said, taking in one of the dangling earrings - it looked like the fang of some sort of animal, wickedly curved and capped in gold. “Amelia not joining us?”

“She had something on,” Cel said, waving a hand, although their expression was a little sour. Zolf hadn’t quite managed to get the ins and outs of that relationship. He knew it was sometimes intimate, sometimes not, and he liked Amelia well enough (she had a military background as well, although the full extent of it he’d never been able to tease out of her). 

“Sorry about that,” Zolf said.

Cel shrugged. “It’s no problem, really. She gets like this when there’s a project on and in the end if she turned up grumpy it would have ruined things and you  _ also  _ look really good, Zolf! That colour shirt is really nice on you…”

Zolf couldn’t help the smile that spread over his face at their words. 

When he’d parked outside he’d seen there were a  _ lot  _ of other cars around - more foot traffic than this part of the city usually saw even on the busiest days. Lights had been set up in the parking lot of what was now, very obviously, Four Seasons Total Landscaping - the sign in bright, bold letters on a green background over what looked like a wrought iron gate. It was cheerful and loud and a cool breeze had started up, easing the heat of the summer night.

Zolf and Cel were greeted at the door by a couple of kobolds holding trays of canapes and drinks. Cel enthusiastically poached both while Zolf took one vol-au-vent which was filled with some sort of delightful fish mixture. He didn’t take a drink. He was going to have to drive home after this after all.

Glancing around it was something of an eclectic group. He could see humans, a few elves, a bunch of halflings who were standing near one very tall… 

“Hey, isn’t that your therapist?” Cel said, nudging at his elbow.

In the corner, standing out the way only Azu could, was a tall orcish woman, with a shaved head, big, dangling pink heart earrings and a beautiful, flowing pink dress. She was holding a glass of champagne and talking animatedly to a halfling man standing next to her with his arm resting… well, he was more reaching up to rest his hand in the small of her back.

He recognised the halfling, once he got a little closer. Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan, the middle son of the richest family in the whole city. 

“Grizzop knows some  _ interestin’  _ folk, it seems,” Zolf said.

Cel nudged him again. “You should go say hi,” they said. “It’d be weird if you didn’t.”

Zolf had a brief internal debate. On the one hand, yeah, it’d be weird if Azu realised he was at the party and hadn’t said hi to her. On the other hand, Azu was one of the only people in the world at present who would understand exactly why he’d not done it.

He sighed. She’d be proud of him if he did, though, which was the important thing in the end. He made his way over to the corner of the party where she was standing, laughing easily at something the Tahan boy had said, and smiled up at her.

“Zolf!” Azu said as soon as she caught sight of him. “I was wondering if you would be here! Hamid didn’t tell me the party was going to be right next door to the crematorium.” She gave him a warm, solid handshake, her hand engulfing his. He’d made the mistake, when he’d first started seeing her, of thinking that she was far more suited to physical labour than the gentle work of therapy, but he’d never had a therapist as good as she was, and that opinion had disappeared pretty quickly . He looked down at the halfing standing next to her, and tried for a friendly smile.

“Hi!” Hamid said, putting out a small, elegantly manicured hand for him to shake. “I’m Hamid Saleh Haroun…”

“Al-Tahan,” Zolf finished for him, nodding. “Yes I recognised you.”

Hamid beamed and Zolf had a moment to take in the full force of his charm. He was very well put together for a halfling, elegantly tailored suit and pants probably costing more than Zolf’s entire salary, some gold rings on his fingers and some sort of gold sheen on his skin as well - make-up, Zolf suspected, although it brought out the dark highlights of his skin very well. 

“And you’re Zolf Smith? The owner of the crematorium next door?” 

Zolf nodded. “You know Grizzop and Vesseek, I take it?”

“Oh yes! They did the grounds work on the western estate, absolutely  _ beautiful  _ work, of course we went through Eva’s company at first but considering they’re closer to the west side now we’ll let them handle the grounds there. Of course Eva’s still working on the main estate but she’s been so overworked for so long it’s a good thing to see that some of her proteges are branching off and making a name for themselves…”

Zolf was a little stuck on the fact that this halfling - this boy, really (Hamid was barely out of his teens, if he recalled correctly) was chattering on about his various different houses but he was, despite his obvious wealth, quite charming, and Azu seemed enraptured by him. Good for her, Zolf thought to himself as he let Hamid’s pleasant chatter wash over him, snagging another vol-eu-vant as they went past. She deserved a bit of luxury and happiness.

A flash in his eyes made Zolf blink and startle and look up into the lens of a camera - a professional looking one at that. The press were here. He tensed up, wondering if it was going to be Carter - but instead found himself face to face with a rather pleasant faced human man, a little on the short side, with swept back dark hair. 

“Sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to startle you.” Zolf took in the press tag on his shirt, scanning it with a frown, worried that Barret had managed to get someone in here just by virtue of him not being Howard Carter, but the press pass was in bold, large writing and did not, thankfully, have any Racket connections. 

_ James Barnes: PA Times. _

The Times was one of the only papers that was halfway reputable, these days, although Zolf generally avoided the news as much as was practical in his line of work. He certainly recommended them rather than the Herald for his clients obituaries. There was nothing quite as crass as seeing the notice of your loved one’s death next to a story claiming (however obliquely) that Goblins Are The Greatest Threat To Democracy or Orcs Are Stealing Your Jobs.

“Mr Tahan, sir?” the man said. “If you have a moment?” 

Hamid’s face was as open and friendly as ever, but Zolf caught a look of shrewd calculation in his eyes before he nodded, dropped his hand from Azu’s waist, and gathered the man into his orbit, steering him away from Zolf and Azu as he did so. “Of course Mr Barnes,” Hamid was saying. “I imagine you have some questions about…” He nodded to Azu and Zolf as he moved away and Zolf looked up at Azu to find her smiling fondly at the retreating halfling.

“You’re going to be in the paper tomorrow, I think, Azu,” Zolf said.

Azu shrugged. “I figured as much when Hamid asked me along,” she said. “It’s still a new thing, between us, but I’m a big enough deal to cope with a few gossip stories.” She beamed down at him, and Zolf couldn't help but smile back. At least, if it was going to be a gossip article about al-Tahan's new lover, it wouldn't be written by Howard Carter.

"He seems nice."

"He is," Azu said. "And before you say anything, yes I know. He's also _filthy_ rich."

Zolf laughed. "Was that a factor in how nice he is?" he asked.

Azu pursed her lips. "No," she said, then winked. "At least not after the third date. How are you going, any way?"

"Well you know better than most. Not much different around here, except..." he waved a hand, indicating the party.

"Indeed," she said, and there was a glint in her eyes. She knew about Wilde, knew about the problems and the drama and the worry. "You have new neighbours."

“They’re nice,” Zolf said, swallowing. “Good… er… lads. Have you met them yet?”

Azu nodded to the side of the car park where he saw Grizzop and Vesseek talking to Sasha. It was startling, seeing Grizzop, whom up till now Zolf had only seen wearing work overalls or once, when he’d been spending the day shifting sacks of fertilizer, just shorts, in a jet black silk shirt and pants, the dark of them offsetting the bright red of his eyes. The few rings in his ears were simple and stark against his dark skin. It was a dramatic contrast and made the goblin look older, more sophisticated - sharp, like a hunter.

By contrast Vesseek was wearing a white fur vest and striped red and white tights, their ears festooned with even more earrings than Cel, and platformed shoes covered in sequins that made them a good few inches taller than Grizzop. He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised that Vesseek could still walk in them, considering on all the other occasions he’d met them they’d been zooming around in heelies, but it was still something of a contrast.

“I suppose they represent the two extremes of design,” Azu was saying. 

“Possibly of personality as well,” Zolf muttered. Azu chuckled. 

“Hamid says they do amazing work, and I’m inclined to agree. The gardens at the west estate are absolutely lovely. And Hamid says they haven’t had to use nearly as much water to keep them healthy, either, which is so important these days, considering.”

One of the other halflings - a sombrely dressed woman who looked around the same age as Hamid, touched Azu’s arm to get her attention, and Azu patted Zolf’s shoulder again. “I’ll see you around, Zolf,” she said. “Try to have some fun.” Zolf rolled his eyes at her, but smiled to offset it, then glanced around to see if he could find Cel.


	9. You've Got Mail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oscar takes his time. Sasha forgets her phone.

“You coming boss?” Sasha was leaning against the door of the back office, arms folded in front of her while she watched him fuss with his hair. It wasn’t curling right, and he was debating whether or not to give it some more product. A lock flopped over one eye and he bit his lip, critically, frowning at his reflection, before glancing up at her.

She looked good, a white button down and slim dark pants, the shirt open at the neck a few buttons more than strictly necessary, showing of the clean long lines of her neck and offsetting the dark of her hair and eyes. 

Sasha scrubbed up beautifully, in fact, although she’d resisted his advice when she’d first started working for him - years of living under the oppressive thumb of her uncle had made her try to avoid standing out in a crowd at all costs.

He was glad she’d come out of her shell a little, enough to not feel weird about dressing up, not to feel weird about being  _ noticed.  _

“You look delectable,” he said, giving her a wink.

“You look like you’re going to have trouble bending over,” Sasha replied, one eyebrow quirking as she raked her eyes down his body. 

Oscar smoothed his hands over his hips, encased as they were in very tight purple cloth.

“Oh darling Sasha believe me I am very capable of bending over in these pants,” he said. “It’s been demonstrated on multiple occasions.”

“You gonna want to be doing some bending tonight, you think?”

Oscar shrugged. “It’s a party, that’s always on the cards, and our neighbours are both very handsome. I’m sure they have plenty of pretty friends.”

Sasha, whom Oscar knew was only tangentially interested in sex under fairly specific circumstances, shrugged. “You do you, mate,” she said. “Or… you know, whoever else you want. Are you coming or are we going to be late? I know you like to make an entrance only they said there were gonna be canapes and…”

Oscar laughed and waved a hand. “Go eat, my love,” he said. “I’ll be there before you know it.”

She snorted and departed. 

Oscar spent another few fruitless minutes messing with his hair before he decided it simply hated him today (and probably all of the time), adjusted his shirt and bent to flick some dust off his shoe. He wouldn’t admit it to Sasha, but it was a little more difficult to do that in these particular trousers, so he didn’t hear anything over his grunt of effort standing back up.

Not that he’d heard anything any of the other times, either. 

He saw the small envelope that had been slipped under the door at some point after Sasha had left and froze. It was the same as all the others had been - a plain, white, fairly cheap looking envelope. Unadorned. No postmark, to make certain that Oscar knew these were being delivered personally. Whoever it was had been at his front door, probably waiting for Sasha to leave so they knew he was in here alone. He felt his lips pull back in a snarl, and snatched it up from the floor. He should just burn it, tear it to shreds right there and then and ignore it, but he opened it like he’d opened every single one of them, and pulled the paper from it…

The bell on the door jingled and Oscar just had time to shove the letter into his back pocket (with a little difficulty - they  _ were  _ very tight pants). 

“Boss?” Sasha was there, blinking at him. “I forgot my…” she pushed past him to the counter, snatching up her phone from where it lay next to the cash register. She waggled it at him. “Thought I’d ring you to bring it for me and then I realised I was an idiot.”

He gave her a wan smile. “Never,” he said, weakly. She grinned at him, then jerked her head towards the door. 

“Let’s go then,” she said. 

He blinked. Nodded. “Sure,” he said, and followed her out.

The paper in his back pocket felt more obvious than if he’d decided to wear that one pair of assless chaps he’d bought as a joke when the shop first opened. He’d  _ never  _ been upset when people ogled his ass, but now it felt like every pair of eyes that drifted downwards could see the tell tale square of paper sitting there, like a fucking brand, all over one of his greatest assets. It was infuriating and was in danger of destroying what had the potential for being a  _ fantastic  _ evening. Grizzop and Vesseek were simply adorable, Grizzop in particular looking sharp enough to cut diamond, the canapes were divine, the chef who made them even more so and Zolf…

Oscar allowed himself a small sigh of longing when he first caught a glimpse of his erstwhile closest neighbour. He was chatting to, of all people, Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan, and yes, Oscar could see Saira and Saleh Junior standing off to the side. Grizzop and Vesseek must do work for them, Oscar realised, and that rocketed his estimation of the pair up a fair way. There was a good chance that of the three businesses on this stretch of road, Grizzop and Vesseek’s was going to be the most lucrative.

But Oscar’s mind was only partially occupied by the halfling and his wealth and prestige, the other half was wholly taken up with how the blue of Zolf’s shirt contrasted with the snow white of his hair, the way it hugged his broad shoulders and fell in soft folds against the curve of his ass. The way he had rolled back the sleeves to reveal the tattoos on his forearms, the way he was smiling slightly at something Hamid was saying, the perpetual scowl of grief and disapproval softened by good humour.

He wouldn’t lie to himself and say that he hadn’t wondered daily since the invitation to this party what Zolf might wear. There had been several rather outrageous fantasies, in fact. But of course, when push came to shove, Zolf had chosen simple and practical, and somehow managed to make it utterly perfect.

“Hello Oscar,” he was brought out of his reverie by a familiar voice near his shoulder and glanced down to see James Barnes, camera in hand and press pass nestling against his far-too unbuttoned shirt.

He sucked in a breath. “James,” he said. “Covering the party?”

James shrugged. “Got word the Tahans were showing up, you know they’re always good for a gossip story. Do you know the orc?” 

“That’s Azu,” Oscar said (James would find it out anyway, he was actually a competent reporter, even if his prose was a little dry). “She’s a therapist, very good one from all accounts.” James gave him a grateful nod, in his serious way. “Seen Howard lately?” Oscar asked, unable to resist the jab. 

James winced and Oscar clapped him on the shoulder in sympathy. “There there, James,” he said. “You know you can do better.”

James let out a forced laugh that ended in a sigh. He and Howard Carter had been on again/off again lovers for years. Personally Oscar thought James could do better, but the poor boy was lovesick half the time and exasperated the rest and there was no reasoning with him in either state. Oscar was hardly one to judge that kind of relationship, given his checkered and salacious past, but he did like James and it would be nice to see him settle down with someone a little less… well. A little less Howard Carter. 

He consoled himself by hoping that eventually one or the other of them would come to their senses, although Oscar wasn’t going to hold his breath when it came to Howard.

“I know you don’t like him.”

“You know my reasons.”

“They’re good reasons,” James nodded, then eyed Oscar critically. “You doing okay?”

Oscar’s stomach did an odd little flip, the letter feeling even more obvious nestled in his pocket, but he forced a smile. “Never better, Jimmy lad, never better,” James eyes narrowed further and Oscar put a gentle hand in the small of his back, pushing him slightly towards Hamid and Azu. “You’d best get over and snag yourself a Tahan, I can see unattended champagne demanding to be drunk.”

James gave him another, far too keen eyed look, then went off to get his story.

Oscar debated going and talking to Zolf, then thought about the letter in his pocket and decided that no, tonight, getting  _ drunk _ would be a fantastic idea. Grizzop and Vesseek hadn’t stinted on the alcohol - it wasn’t the best champagne Oscar had ever had but it was most certainly passable. 

He was on his third glass when he managed to get up to Grizzop himself. The goblin was doing a good job of not looking nervous and anxious, but Oscar was equally good at reading people (even if he was slightly tipsy) and he could see the quiver in Grizzop’s ears and the slight narrowing of his eyes whenever someone approached.

“I come in peace, Sir Grizzop,” Oscar said, pressing a champagne into the goblin’s hands.

“I’m not a knight, Wilde.”

“No but you’d make a very dashing one,” Oscar said. “This is a  _ lovely  _ party, by the way.”

“You’ll have to thank Vesseek for most of it,” Grizzop replied, although Oscar was pleased to see he took the champagne and started to sip it. “They’re very much into party organisation.”

Oscar didn’t have to look far to find Vesseek, their clothing choices were almost as impeccable as Zolf’s had been for this evening, and they were dancing enthusiastically with Cel over near the DJ booth. Oscar grinned to see they were being observed with not a little bemusement by some of the other guests, including the elder Tahans. Dancing… would be nice. But out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of something else that would be even nicer.

The pastry chef behind the amazing canapes was removing his apron and rolling up the sleeves of his uniform - shift obviously done with. Oscar tipped his champagne glass to Grizzop, who was distracted by another guest. “Have another glass or two, darling,” he said. “No point throwing a party if you don’t enjoy it too.”

“Not throwing it to have fun, Wilde,” Grizzop said, but he smiled a little as he said it. “You look good by the way.”

Oscar beamed at him, resisting the almost overwhelming urge to boop his nose. There was an air around Grizzop that made him think it might not be the best idea.

He had a sudden, all senses flashback of the first time he’d dared to do that to Zolf, and the subsequent results. Perhaps he  _ was  _ learning in his old age.

Oscar winked instead, then straightened up and headed over to what he hoped would be his project for the rest of the evening.


	10. A Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop has a Plan.

Grizzop vibrated. He couldn’t help it, honestly, this was precisely the sort of thing he hated on every level, having to play nice and socialise and talk to people about his business. There was a reason Vesseek was the one who answered the phone. Grizzop knew plants and dirt and layouts and flower combinations, and while Eva had always said he was good with people he’d never been able to convince himself that she was telling the truth.

The mix of guests seemed to be good, though. Old clients of Eva’s, the Tahans the biggest name, but there were a scattering of other folks from various parts of the city that Grizzop had had dealings with over the years. He’d done a lot of work for the University, so Tjelvar and Colgate and Curie were here - Colgate seemed to know the Tahans quite well and Tjelvar was animatedly chatting with Cel. Eva, looking astonishingly beautiful, was off to the side of that group, standing tall and smiling while she talked to Curie. 

Grizzop allowed himself a small sigh when he saw her. He’d never really worked out if his crush on her was hero worship or something more, never really wanted to, when it came down to it. She’d been his boss and his mentor and part of his life for so long that it didn’t really matter, either, but he could, at times like these, remember the first time they’d ever met, and how utterly convinced he’d been that she was a goddess out of legend.

He’d been tiny at the time, of course, but that feeling had never quite left him.

“You should come dance,” Vesseek said to him after an hour or so had gone by. He’d seen Zolf, talked briefly to Wilde, and drunk exactly half a glass of champagne.

“You know I don’t dance, ‘Seek,” Grizzop said. 

“You just say that because you want to maintain your grumpy image.”

“I still don’t dance, though.”

“You’re _no fun.”_

Grizzop grinned at them. They had enough fun together, most of the time. “Go dance without me,” he said. “I think Cel might be interested.”

Vesseek looked around to see the tall half-elf eyeing the dj booth and all but skipped over to them. Grizzop spent the next few minutes watching them twist and turn around each other on the dance floor, smiling to himself about how they were somehow able to make it work, despite Vesseek being at most, half Cel’s height.

He finished his champagne and looked around for a surface to put the glass on, realised that he really should just take it into the pop up kitchen and maybe get himself some water while he was there. The strain of so many people, most of them looking at him or wanting his attention, was starting to wear thin.

He slipped into the tent where the canapes had been made and moved to one of the portable fridges, intending to get a bottle of water and just relax for a few minutes, away from people.

That’s when he noticed the two men in the corner.

It was easy enough to recognise Wilde, those purple pants stood out in the crowd. The large hands that were currently cupping Wilde’s ass through them, however, weren’t as easily placed, until he heard a gasp and a beautiful blond head was tossed back against the stacked crates in the corner of the tent. 

Wilde was busy doing something at Ed’s neck that Ed seemed to be enjoying immensely, if his noises were anything to go by, and he heard Wilde give a chuckle that was slightly muffled by skin. 

Grizzop, bottle of water still in his hand, froze. He should just leave, but he was worried now that any movement on his part would alert the couple to his presence, and however awkward and out of place he felt out in the party it couldn’t be anything anywhere near as awkward and awful he’d feel if Ed…

… Opened his eyes.

“Oh. Hello,” he said, “Mr Grizzop, sorry I ah…” he stood up, dragging his hands up and over Wilde’s ass. 

Grizzop caught a glimpse of paper as it fell out of Wilde’s pocket.

“Eddie what…?” Wilde said, then turned and saw Grizzop.

He straightened up, giving Grizzop an apologetic grin. “Oops,” he said.

Grizzop rolled his eyes. “Don’t mind me,” he said.

“Oh we don’t,” Ed said. Wilde gave Grizzop a helpless little smile, indicating with a jerk of his head everything that was Ed, before taking Ed’s hand and tugging him back towards the party. 

“We really should get back out there, Eddie,” he said. “Aren’t the waitstaff going to be packing up in here soon?”

“They don’t start until after the party finishes,” Ed was saying. “But we can go out again if you want…”

Wilde chuckled again, and patted Grizzop on the shoulder as they passed. “My apologies,” he said, slightly slurred. “Still a good party though.”

Grizzop shook his head. “No worries, Wilde,” he said, watching them stumble out, then he turned his head back to the paper that had dropped on the floor.

“Oh… oi Wilde you…” He picked it up, only realising that it was an envelope that had been ripped open after the letter inside fluttered down to the floor as he straightened. He sighed and bent down again to pick up the letter, glancing down at it - probably a bill or something, or maybe Ed’s phone number… or… 

It wasn’t any of those things.

Grizzop blinked, running his eyes over the heavy typed letters. It was short, although not as short as it could have been given the sentiments expressed, and it was _awful._

It wasn’t difficult to make the connection between this and the graffiti on the wall of Oscar’s shop, it wasn’t difficult to realise that there was a reason why Oscar was drunk and making out with a stranger in a pop up kitchen, if this was the kind of mail he was getting.

He ran his eyes over the letter again, feeling sickness settle in his stomach. It was a violation of privacy, to have seen it, but he couldn’t _unsee_ it now, and if Oscar knew that it was missing Grizzop would understand if he panicked. He went back outside, intending to find Oscar and give it to him and… he didn’t know, lie about it? Somehow convince the man he hadn’t seen what had been written. 

It was criminal, of that much he was certain. You couldn’t threaten to do the sorts of things in the letter without some sort of repercussions, surely? But Grizzop remembered Zolf’s face when he’d suggested going to the police about the graffiti and Grizzop’s guts twisted in anger and frustration, even as he scanned the party for Ed or Oscar. Oscar, at least, was easy to spot - all six feet three of him. His hair was slightly mussed and he had one arm slung over Ed’s shoulders as he chatted with Zolf and was that… yeah that was Tjelvar, looking awkward and a little exasperated at whatever Oscar was saying.

Grizzop swallowed and made his way over to them, the letter still clutched in his hand.

Zolf noticed him first, standing leaning heavily on his cane (Grizzop should have arranged more seating at the party, he thought angrily to himself - they needed to think about things like accessibility for customers) and gave him a nod. Grizzop swallowed and nodded back. “You doing all right?” he asked.

“Doing fine, Grizzop,” he said. “It’s a great party, you should be proud.”

“I think I’ve got some chairs in the office if you want me to…”

Zolf smiled and shook his head. “It’s fine. Don’t get pain just from standing around, it’s more if I try to do anything more vigorous.” He nodded towards the dance floor, where Cel and of all people, the journalist, were dancing very enthusiastically, while Vesseek clapped on the sidelines. Grizzop’s ears twitched and he fought back a smile, almost forgetting about the letter in his hand, until Zolf glanced down at it. “What have you got there?” he said, and his voice was sharp and pointed and prickly.

“Oh. Um. Oscar dropped it, I was just…”

But Zolf was too fast for him. He snatched the letter out of Grizzop’s hand and reached up with his other to grab Wilde by the lapel of his shirt, his cane clattering to the ground. 

Wilde nearly overbalanced into the dwarf’s arms, but Ed steadied him.

“Zolf, really you don’t have to…” 

“Shut up and come with me,” Zolf growled, and proceeded to stalk away, limping heavily. Grizzop snatched up the cane, gave Ed a helpless look, then followed after them.

They were back in the kitchen tent, Grizzop caught up with them just as Zolf was spinning Wilde around to face him up against one of the counters. Wilde looked uncharacteristically glum, arms crossed over his chest and head bowed down, like a sulky teenager about to get a stern lecture.

“You said there hadn’t been any more,” Zolf was saying as Grizzop came in.

“No, actually,” Wilde said, “I didn’t say anything of the sort. I very carefully avoided answering any of your questions about the letters and…”

“When did this one arrive?”

Wilde sighed and looked to the side, then to Grizzop, and gave Grizzop a sad little wave. “Do you really want to do this in company, Zolf? You can take me back to the crematorium and chastise me there if that’s what gets you going I don’t need…”

“Wilde, for _fuck’s_ sake.”

“Did you read it, Grizzop?” Wilde asked, and there was a note of hope in his voice. Grizzop swallowed and nodded, and Zolf moved aside so that he could see both of them. As with the graffiti, there was a coiled fury in the dwarf that made him almost frightening. 

“I uh… here,” he held out Zolf’s cane, and Zolf took it, planting it in front of him and leaning on it with both hands. 

“Thank you,” he said.

“I’m sorry you read it,” Wilde said, and his voice was soft and small. There was a long, pointed silence as the three of them looked at each other. 

“Someone really hates you, don’t they?” Grizzop asked, finally, and Oscar sighed and rolled his eyes.

“You got _that_ impression from the letter?” he said. “Here I was just thinking they liked the colour of my…”

“Can you be serious for _one fucking second,_ Wilde?” Zolf hissed. 

“No I fucking can _not_ Zolf, what will being _serious_ do to help?”

“They’re sending you _death threats._ We _have_ to go to the police.”

Wilde pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and his shoulders slumped even further. For the first time since meeting him, Grizzop realised that he was _tired._ The kind of bone tired that only came with persistent and unrelenting stress. 

The kind of bone tired that came hand in hand with fear.

“You know that’s not going to help, Zolf,” Wilde said, and his voice was stripped of all it’s colour as well. 

Zolf slumped against the counter, his body language the mirror of Wilde’s. They’d been going through this for a while, Grizzop could tell. Together. Grizzop swallowed. “Ah…” he said. “Um.”

They both looked towards him. “You know who is sending these?” he said.

“We have a pretty good idea, yeah,” Zolf said, glancing up at Wilde, who spread his hands. 

“Look, this isn’t anything to do with you, Grizzop. I’m sorry you got dragged in it’s just the letter came as I was going out the door and…”

“Whoever is writing those needs to pay,” Grizzop said, cutting him off. Wilde snorted, but Zolf was nodding. “I’m guessing the local police aren’t…”

“They’re corrupt and probably helping out,” Wilde said. “Wouldn’t be surprised if someone is using the precinct typewriter to bash them out during their lunch break. And before you ask, yes I did send the first few to them. No prints, no way to trace them. No suspects, despite the rather detailed list of possible perpetrators with which they were provided.”

“We set up surveillance cameras,” Zolf said. “Tried to catch them delivering them. They got smashed and we couldn’t really justify repeating the expense. Especially since the police couldn’t find who did _that_ either.”

Grizzop crossed his arms over his chest, foot tapping impatiently as he examined the problem from all angles. “They’re being delivered by hand?”

Wilde nodded. 

“Well then, it’s easy,” he said. “We just have to catch them doing it.”

“How, precisely?” Wilde said. 

“You said they smashed the cameras?” 

“Yes. First night they went up.”

“Well they can’t smash _me.”_

Zolf raised an eyebrow. “You planning to keep watch over Wilde’s shop for how ever many days it takes for a letter to arrive?”

Grizzop shrugged. “Not just me, we can do it in shifts. How often do the letters come?”

Zolf shot Wilde a look, and Wilde looked sheepish. “I’ve been getting one a day, the last two weeks.” Zolf gave an angry growl and Wilde held up a hand. “I love it when you get all protective of me, Zolf, but honestly this _isn’t_ your problem and…”

“Shut up,” Zolf said. “So you’re saying we only need to keep watch for twenty-four hours.”

“Sure. It’s easy enough. We can use Vesseek’s van, we don’t have any jobs until next week and they won’t suspect it since it’s company. We need a sheltered vantage point with a good view of the shop. Where do the letters turn up?”

“Under the front door, usually.”

“Fine, easy then, we can park across the street. Take it in shifts, four hours each.” Grizzop sucked in a breath and let it out, ears flicking.

Zolf and Wilde were both looking at Grizzop quizzically. “Wot?” he said.

“How… do you know all this?”

Grizzop shrugged again. “Did surveillance work for a PI for a while, before Eva took me in. It’s a shitty job but it paid the bills.” 

_My little hunter, Grizzop. You_ always _get your man._

He shuddered slightly, memory overtaking him, then flicked it off. He knew how to do this. They were just being stubborn about it.

“Well?” he asked. “We find him we can get him to stop.”

“I mean, I don’t know if it’ll be that simple,” Wilde said.

“Oh?”

“It’ll be a start,” Zolf said. “If we can catch the delivery man we’d have a bit more than just the letters as evidence for the police, or at least for a civil suit if the police keep being useless idiots.”

“Why are you…” Wilde started, then stopped. “You don’t have to help us, Grizzop. We barely know you.”

“Neighbours,” Grizzop said. 

Wilde made a face. “True but you’re still going above and beyond what…”

“I’m gonna have to live with you for the next however many years, and I like you. You’re… like my…” he sucked at his teeth, searching for the right word. “You’re my pack, I guess. My people. I’m never wrong about people.” A few choice mistakes he’d made over the years flashed before his eyes and he flicked an ear. “Or… well yeah sometimes I’m wrong about people but I don’t think I’m wrong about you.” Zolf was smiling now and it was a _nice_ smile, full of gratitude and fondness. Grizzop wanted to make him smile like that more often. Wilde’s expression was more bewildered, as though he couldn’t believe anyone would bother helping him, and that… well. That made Grizzop _angry._ “Any way, whoever is writing those letters is an evil fucking asshole, no matter what you might have done in your past or whatever, you don’t deserve to be getting things like that in your mail. No one does.”

Wilde looked at Zolf who raised an eyebrow at him, then shook his head, smiling. “Not polite to turn down help when it’s offered, is it Wilde?”

“And when have I ever cared about being polite?” Wilde said airily.

“Certainly not when you were snogging my staff in here earlier,” Grizzop said and Zolf let out a sigh.

_“Really?”_

“Zolf you _keep turning me down_ I have to keep myself amused somehow.”

Zolf chuckled then turned back to Grizzop, holding out a hand. “Look, Wilde’s right, you don’t have to help and I’m sorry you got caught up in this, but… it’s appreciated. Really. This shit’s gone on long enough.”

Grizzop took Zolf’s hand in his, noticing how big and wide and strong the fingers were. Solid. They shook, and Grizzop looked up at Wilde.

Wilde made another face. “Fine,” he said, and put out his hand to shake Grizzop’s. “I guess this means we have a plan.”

(please check out this amazing art by @areyouokaypanda as well guys! https://areyouokaypanda.tumblr.com/post/636926124091441152/hey-so-icescrabblerjerky-is-writing-an )


	11. Investigators

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zolf learns that the life of a PI is boring and hot.

Zolf felt ridiculous, as though he was the protagonist in some sort of bad spy movie, going over the instructions Grizzop had given him regarding surveillance of the shop. Obviously Wilde couldn’t be the one who kept watch, Wilde had to be inside and on shift, preferably alone considering most of the letters had been delivered when there were no customers and Sasha was on break. Wilde had been reluctant to give details, but a kind of pattern had emerged as to when they could expect a delivery, and given Zolf’s lack of mobility (as well as the fact that he had two bodies coming in later that day) he was on first shift. Early morning.

It was only a couple of hours, but Grizzop was business like in telling him how he needed to operate.

“You don’t sit in the front seat,” he said. “Work vans are the best for surveillance because they’re always parked about and we’ve got the biggest advantage because you’ll be in ours, which actually belongs here, so the scumbag won’t suspect anything. But there’s nothing more suspicious than someone sitting in the front seat of a van outside your house - creepy as fuck and obvious, so you sit back here and look out through the side window.” The windows of the van were tinted so it was difficult to see inside - closer inspection revealed that the job had been done after manufacture - some sort of plastic coating. Grizzop noticed him looking at them and shrugged.

“I’ve had this van for years. It didn’t always have the four seasons logo on it.”

Zolf settled in the spot that Grizzop had made for him, an actual swivel chair, cut down low so it fit comfortably in the van. “Customised for the job,” he explained, when Zolf raised an incredulous eyebrow at it. 

“How long were you in the PI business, any way?”

Grizzop shrugged. “A couple of years. It’s no fun, really, way more boring than you’d think, mostly just tracking down folks for insurance fraud and peeing in a bottle in a boiling hot van. I much prefer to be out in the sunshine.”

“Well hopefully this will only take a little while and you can go back to it.” 

Grizzop patted his hand. “Sasha’ll be out in a couple of hours to take over, remember, you need to sit in the van with her for a while before you get out, make sure no one is watching when you do.”

“Understood.”

“Got your camera?”

Zolf had to hold back a smile. “Yes. And my phone. I will call if I see anything.”

Grizzop nodded, sucked in a breath, then slipped over the front seat of the van to get out through the passenger side door. Zolf settled back in the surprisingly comfortable chair to wait.

If he’d been allowed to read, it would have been fine. But of course he couldn’t read, not while he was meant to be watching the shop, and despite the comfort of the chair the waiting very quickly became interminable. 

It didn’t help that as the sun rose higher in the sky the van started to heat up. There was very little shade on the street once it got past about 8am and Zolf was sweating and uncomfortable, itching where his prosthesis joined his leg, and thoroughly, utterly bored by the time Sasha knocked on the passenger side door and slipped in the same way Grizzop had exited a few hours previously.

“Wotcher Zolf,” she said. “Nice set up in here, yeah?” 

“Not exactly the words I’d use,” Zolf said. “Here, you’ll want to sit in the chair.”

“Hold up, not yet. Grizz said we need to wait at least a half hour before you leave and you’re better off in there than I am.”

She was right, of course, and he watched her sit back on her haunches across from him in the back of the truck, dark eyes scanning back and forth across the front of Wilde’s shop.

“Haven’t seen anyone yet,” Zolf said. “Wilde arrived about an hour ago, two customers, and the mailman. It’s hot and boring.”

“Stakeouts are always boring,” Sasha said, absently.

Zolf blinked. Then moved on. Sasha had a checkered and varied past and Zolf was aware there’d been at least one stint in prison before she’d come to work at Wilde’s but he’d never really gotten the full details of what she’d done before.

“What do you think they’re trying to do, with all this?” Zolf asked.

“Tryin’ to hurt Wilde,” Sasha said, shrugging. “Trying to make him leave the city. Get him out of the way.”

“Why?”

Sasha gave him a look.

They’d had this conversation before. Many, many times actually, over the years that Zolf and Wilde had been neighbours. He’d had the conversation with Wilde (who dismissed it), with Cel, (who thought up long and elaborate plots to undermine Barret and restore Wilde’s good name) and with Sasha.

Sasha knew the most about it, of course. Sasha had been with Wilde when the shop opened, a constant shadow next to him.

A defector, of a sorts, was Sasha Rackett, and almost certainly one of the reasons why Barret’s campaign against Wilde had never fallen off, had only gathered steam over the years as Sasha stayed stubbornly loyal.

So yeah, they’d had this conversation many, many times but no matter how often it repeated, Zolf couldn’t bring himself to completely understand it. People were  _ better  _ than this. Or they should be. He had to hope that somehow they were, any way, otherwise what was the fucking point?

“Zolf, you  _ know _ why,” Sasha said, waving a hand. “It’s Cos Barret’s a vindictive bastard and he lost  _ face  _ because of Wilde. That’s unforgivable, in his books. Wilde’s lucky he’s not straight up murdering him.”

“He doesn’t do that, does he?”

Sasha raised an eyebrow at him. “I dunno, mate, I’m well out of it now. I don’t  _ think _ so. But there’s more ways of killin’ people than just shooting them in the head.”

Zolf sighed. She was right, of course. You could destroy a person’s life, for example. Force them to go into hiding, abandon the things and the people that they love. 

Zolf knew Wilde didn’t think that could ever happen to him, but Zolf had been close enough to that once to know that there wasn’t anything that could cushion that kind of blow. He wasn’t going to let Wilde get there. Wilde didn’t deserve it.

He felt Sasha pat his knee, although she was still looking out at the shop, scanning for their quarry, alert and poised as always. “I know you’re worried about ‘im,” she said. “We all are, really.”   
“He’s an idiot,” Zolf said, and Sasha gave a chuckle. 

“Yeah, but he’s  _ our  _ idiot, right?”

Zolf swallowed, thinking of Wilde in the kitchen tent the night before, in those ridiculous pants, lips still kiss-red from his dalliance with the chef, hair tousled.

Wilde, looking down at his feet, arms crossed over his chest, trying so very, very hard to reject their help. Trying to do it on his own.

“It’s stupid hot in here,” Sasha said and Zolf heaved a breath.

“Yeah and having two of us in here isn’t helping. Time for me to bugger off. Cel will come and take over from you in a couple of hours - but if it gets too hot or you see something…”

She waggled her phone at him. "'sall good Zolf. You go cool off." He smiled at her, then painstakingly made his way out of the van and carefully walked around the block before returning to the crematorium. 

He hesitated at the door, looking over to Wilde’s shop. The fresh paint on the side was still obvious to him, although he suspected it was only because he knew it was there. The dust of the desert would make it indistinguishable to even him in a few more days.

There was no one about, only the occasional car driving down the wide street, but Zolf still felt as though he was being watched.

He sighed and went inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So interesting facts about Miri: I spent three years working as a personal assistant to a Private Investigator. While I never actually did any surveillance jobs, I worked with a whole heap of guys who did, and yeah, it's hot, boring and annoying work, and YES they do pee in bottles while they're on a job. You really REALLY don't want to be trapped in one of their vans.


	12. Daydream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oscar is pensive, Grizzop is determined. Sneaky cigarettes are smoked.

Grizzop slipped in the door, barely making the bell ring, reminding Oscar of Sasha. Oscar had noticed the way Grizzop moved (had been watching him, in their few discussions, and even out of the window of his office some days as he rearranged plants and pots and sacks of fertilizer, the play of wiry muscles under his arms, sheened with sweat in the summer sun) with quiet efficiency, nothing wasted or flippant. Only his ears shifted and changed as he talked and Oscar had learned to watch those for expression, even more than his eyes.

“Everything set up?” Oscar asked, trying to keep the nervousness out of his tone.

“Zolf’s settled,” Grizzop said. “Just checking in to make sure you’re doing okay.”

Oscar rested his chin in his palm, looking at Grizzop over the counter. “I still don’t know why you’re doing this for me,” he said.

Grizzop’s ear flicked. “I told you. You’re my neighbour.”

Oscar shrugged. “You don’t even know  _ why  _ they’re doing what they’re doing,” he said. “I could be a monster. I could be everything they’re writing about me, have you considered that?”

Grizzop tilted his head, that ear flicking again. “Are you?”

Oscar let out a breath, laughing a little at the sheer audacity of it. “I don’t  _ think _ I am,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “But I will admit that when it comes to judging my own actions I am hardly impartial.”

“Zolf trusts you,” Grizzop said. “Sasha trusts you.”

“They might be just as bad as I am.”

Grizzop’s lips pressed together in a hard line and he crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m better at people than that.”

Oscar contemplated him for a long moment, the ramrod straight way he stood, the set of his shoulders. He was so very fierce, this goblin, and Oscar wondered what in the world could possibly have made him so.

He let out a breath and waved a hand. “Fine,” he said. “I’ve already accepted your help so it’s moot, this discussion of whether I deserve it. And… thank you. Again.”

Grizzop relaxed a little at that, and stepped further into the shop, glancing up at a display of sybians as he passed. Those ears flicked again in what Oscar was coming to recognise as amusement. “I don’t know exactly what happened, with Barret and the paper, just bits and pieces that are on the internet.”

“Barret has expunged most of the details, as much as one can these days,” Oscar said. “And they’re largely irrelevant.”

“So why is he doing this to you?”

“You’ve come to the conclusion that Barret is behind this?” Oscar asked, raising an eyebrow.

Grizzop shrugged. “Seems logical.”

“It does, doesn’t it.”

“I mean, if you’re out of the way and not trying to do whatever it is he didn’t want you to do then why bother attacking you at all? Why not let things be?”

“Because, in the end, I’m not the monster, Grizzop,” Oscar said, sighing. “But I very much think that Barret is.”

Grizzop’s phone buzzed and he reached into the pocket of his overalls, pulling it out and speaking briefly to Vesseek on the other line. “I have to go,” he said, as he hung up, looking back at Oscar, head tilting again. 

“Of course,” Oscar said. “I’ve kept you from your business long enough as it is.”

“We’re gonna catch this guy, Wilde.”

Oscar made a noncommittal sound and waved Grizzop away.

*

Oscar couldn’t abide being idle. He had work to do, always. “Running a little shop” had seemed like a quaint idea to him, back when he’d first conceived of it. He’d thought about it idly when he’d worked at the paper - settling down in some small village and starting a bookshop envisioning himself sitting behind a counter, very little like the one he was stuck behind right now - dark mahogany and spread with leather bound tomes rather than a display of pink ticklers and a stack of naughty magazines. He'd sit there, flipping through first editions, perhaps wearing an elegant pair of spectacles, engaging the odd young, handsome customer in hearty literary debate.

There would be a case of fine alcohol in the back room where he did the business of his business, a place to share a drink with valued customers. The chair behind his desk would be fine quality leather and the window would look out onto green fields or cobbled streets.

There were vague ideas of unpacking boxes of books and putting them on shelves, serving the odd customer, maybe doing special mail orders for high profile clients.

An easy, quiet, _settled_ life.

Of course he’d known this was a daydream at the time. He wasn’t as sheltered as all that, to think that running a small business that actually made money would be relaxing, but that wasn’t the point of it, after all, it was a daydream, one that his former friends would scoff at if he’d ever given voice to it. “You couldn’t live a quiet life if you tried, Oscar,” they would say, and he would laugh with them, and he would privately wonder if they were right.

_ A Wilde Ride  _ though, was not a fantasy. It was what paid his bills these days (largely, although there was a payment for a short story - submitted under a pseudonym, naturally - that had hit his bank account a few weeks ago - a pittance, but enough that whenever he checked his accounts he allowed himself the smallest smile and a sliver of future hope). The downside to the shop not being a fantasy was that there was a lot of actual work to do, stocklists and ordering and accounts and payroll and tinkering with the website (he didn’t do that on his own, not after the first disastrous attempt, but there was a good kid he paid to do major changes who lived a few blocks from his apartment in town). 

He had taxes to sort out today - taxes that he’d been putting off for too long, but the numbers swirled on the computer screen in front of him in  _ highly irritating ways  _ and he found himself looking up at the front door to the shop every few seconds, wondering what Zolf was seeing from the van, wondering if Sasha was safe, listening, constantly listening for the sound of footsteps on the pavement that approached and then stopped…

Wilde hadn’t smoked in years, but he knew Sasha kept a packet on the shelf next to the counter and he also knew that he desperately needed to do something with his hands that wasn’t tearing out his own hair. He reached for it, opened it, and found inside one single cigarette and a note scrawled in Sasha’s handwriting.

_ Don’t make a habit of it, boss. _

He let out a startled chortle, but took the cigarette anyway, moving to the back office but leaving it open so he could continue to watch the door. As he breathed in the mild smoke and felt the first hit of dizziness from nicotine, he sent out a private thanks in his mind to Sasha, for everything she’d been to him over the years. On the second drag he did the same for Zolf, for Cel and for Grizzop and Vesseek, who didn’t have to be doing this for him, but who were, in the end, far truer friends than any he’d had before he’d set up shop here, in the back end of a dusty suburb in a city that was either too hot or too cold and that had tried to chew him up and spit him back out of it with all of its not inconsiderable cruelty.

It wasn’t the daydream but it was, in the end, where he felt at home, where he felt wanted and where he felt appreciated, and as he finished the last of the cigarette, he felt that hard knot of anxiety and anger that had been coiling in his gut for  _ years  _ settle into something bigger, more urgent, but at the same time, something easier to bear.

_ We’re gonna catch this guy, Wilde,  _ Grizzop had said to him. For the first time Oscar allowed himself to believe that yes, they  _ would. _


	13. Swedish Fish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop and Sasha make some discoveries.

The first official day of business was slow, just as Grizzop had been expecting. Vesseek was working on sourcing plants for their first official job with the university and Grizzop was sketching out a plan for a small garden one suburb over that he’d visited the week before.

Grizzop sketched out a few layouts that made him vaguely unsatisfied, his attention wandering to the van out the front of A Wilde Ride and the man himself, sitting at his counter looking melancholy -  _ I could be everything they’re writing about me, have you considered that?  _ \- so very different from that first meeting.

It had only been a few weeks. He didn’t know why this man - these  _ people  _ had captured his attention and care so quickly, but then Eva had always said he was quick to judge and quick to care and in the end he didn’t think it was necessarily a character flaw.

“You’re going to take over from Sasha, yeah?” Vesseek asked as they came off a telephone call a little less chirpy than they normally were. He knew they’d had to deal with Dave and Steve from Steve’s Sunny Selections and for all they provided absolutely excellent quality saplings and even better mature trees they were both at least five blankets short of a picnic and talking to either of them for more than ten minutes was a chore even for Vesseek.

“If you can handle things here?” 

Vesseek shrugged. “Dave’s going to drop the maples here at three, don’t suppose you’ll let me get drunk before then?”

“Dave wouldn’t notice.”

“No but it’d make it difficult to drive home.”

Grizzop checked his phone - he would need to be out at the van soon. Hopefully Sasha wasn’t too hot in there, although he’d gotten the impression she could deal with a lot of extreme circumstances.

“I’m gonna grab some snacks and drinks for Sasha,” he said, shoving his sketches aside and hoping that the anxiety about Oscar and the letters was all that was making the work more difficult today.

“Cool idea,” Vesseek said, reaching out and spinning the sketch so they could have a look at it. “You know you could put bellflowers down this slope and it’d offset the…” they said, tapping at one part of the sketch that had been giving Grizzop a headache.

“Your input, as always, is appreciated, ‘Seek,” Grizzop said, rolling his eyes. They picked up a pencil and Grizzop was certain by the time he got back there’d be annotations all over his drawings, most of which would be wildly inappropriate for climate but some of which would be utterly, profoundly perfect. 

There was a reason they were a team.

Vesseek looked up and he realised he’d been staring, fondly, at his partner’s fingers as they gripped the pencil. “Wot?” they said, and Grizzop shook his head, leaning over to give them a quick peck on the top of their fuzzy head. 

“Love you,” he said, and Vesseek swatted him away, blushing a little but smiling with it.

“Soppy bastard. Go feed up Sasha and catch this asshole, eh?”

Grizzop raided the kitchen for some soda and some swedish fish and made his way out to the van, taking the long way around so he wouldn’t be observed from the few places around A Wilde Ride Grizzop knew from experience a lurker waiting for an opportunity to deliver a letter might be hiding. He knocked softly on the passenger side door then climbed inside, to find Sasha perched on the arm of the chair that he’d left Zolf in, peering out the window with a lot more professional attention than the dwarf had managed.

He had some suspicions about Sasha, and the evidence was mounting as time went on. Not that he’d ask any direct questions - he didn’t even know her last name and she’d never offered it - but her manner and the things she knew suggested that Wilde hadn’t hired her fresh from the local Catholic Girls college.

“Wotcher,” he said. She waved at him and he plonked the packet of fish in her hand.

“Oh brilliant,” she said, glancing down at it for a brief second before opening it, keeping her eyes on the building and popping three of the sweets in her mouth.

“Seen anything?”

“Nothing. Just old Al with the mail, I think he got it wrong again, that guy really doesn’t know numbers at all, which is weird for a mailman.”

Grizzop, who had received several letters addressed to Wilde and a few to Zolf over the past few weeks, agreed. “Well at least we know we’re getting all our mail eventually, even if it means we have to walk it over.”

Sasha flashed a grin back at him. She was  _ very  _ good at this, sharp eyed and full of attention, the glance back at him so brief he could almost have missed it, and Grizzop almost opened his mouth to ask her a question…

“Me and Cel, we have a bet going that Al wants Wilde and Zolf to get together, and that’s why he keeps getting the mail wrong. They never would have talked to each other past the first time they met if they hadn’t kept getting the wrong mail, you know that right?”

Grizzop blinked. “Why not? They seem to get on fine now.”

“Yeah nah,” Sasha said, chuckling even more. “First time they met Wilde booped him on the nose so Zolf headbutted him.”

Grizzop tilted his head, trying to work out the logistics of that. Wilde was a good two feet taller than Wilde, if Zolf had  _ headbutted  _ him then…

Sasha was still chuckling. “Yeah. He had to jump to do it.”

“So they’re not… they’re not a thing then?” Grizzop had been wondering, given the amount of care they displayed towards each other, that maybe they had something similar to what he had with Vesseek. 

Sasha shrugged. “Not my area of expertise, mate,” she said, eyes still raking back and forth across the street through the window. “I’m not really into that sort of… hold up…”

She held up a hand, leaning forward towards the window, one eyebrow raising, still chewing on one of her sweets. “Got someone coming up to the door.”

She beckoned him over to the window. It was close quarters, with both of them looking out, but Grizzop could see the street was empty aside from one slight figure moving along the street at a quick pace. They weren’t being stealthy at all, but they  _ were  _ wearing a hoodie, and given the fierce heat of the summer sun, that alone was suspicious enough.

Sasha had pulled out her phone and was taking pictures, quick snaps as she frowned through the glass.

“What’s wrong?” 

She gave a small shrug. “Dunno. Something’s off.”

She continued to take snaps as the person approached A Wilde Ride. When they leaned down at the front door she turned and gave him a nod, and Grizzop slipped out the passenger side door.

Keeping an eye on the person as they straightened up from behind the van, he noted which way they walked, off towards the previously-graffitied side of A Wilde Ride, and turning down the relatively narrow alleyway that separated it from Four Seasons. 

As soon as they were out of sight, Grizzop sped across the street and poked a head around the side of the building. The person wasn’t hurrying away, they were walking at a strictly casual pace, hands in the pockets of their hoodie, shoulders hunched. Grizzop popped his head back around, took a deep breath, then simply walked out into the alleyway, casually, as if he was supposed to be there.

The person didn’t notice him, at least, not at first, not until his phone buzzed in his pocket.

He had it on silent, but the air was still and both the person in front of him and Grizzop were quiet walkers. At the soft buzz of it against him, the person glanced back. Grizzop caught a glimpse of dark hair over eyes in a thin face which widened, before they spun on their heel and bolted.

Art had always said he had the instincts of a hunter and Art had never been wrong about him, right up until she had been. 

He didn’t think. He just ran.

He was still fast, faster than anyone he’d ever chased down before now, but the person he was after was faster, something that surprised Grizzop even as he watched them leap over a dumpster and spin round the back of A Wilde Ride. They were trying to go right around the building, he realised, get back onto the main road and to whatever vehicle they’d parked, or to a lift from someone. He pushed himself harder, trying to catch the person who was sensible, not wasting time on looking behind him, just using every bit of their focus to go just that  _ little bit  _ too fast for Grizzop to catch them.

He was going to lose them, he thought, cursing as they spun back onto the main road, he was going to lose them and this would have been for nothing and they would know now, that Wilde had help and that…

He skidded round the corner, back onto the main road, to see Sasha standing in front of the prone figure of the person he’d been trying to catch. Her foot was on their chest, which Grizzop could see was heaving up and down as they gasped for breath.

She looked up as Grizzop approached and grinned. “Wotcher Grizzop,” she said. “Got ‘im.” 

“You did,” Grizzop said, ashamed that his own breath was coming a little faster than it should after such a short run. He came up beside her to look down at the person who had been delivering the letters to Wilde. He - they looked far more like a he this close - wasn’t much in appearance, his clothes were shabby and he was turning his face away from them, presumably to hide it. “Let’s find out who he is then,” Grizzop said and leaned down.

The guy tried to wriggle away from Grizzop, but Grizzop ended that by simply sitting on his chest, not so it would hurt, but definitely so Sasha could lean past him and peel the hoodie away from his head, exposing a young face - dark hair and eyes, sharp jaw and a dusting of facial hair that didn’t quite want to grow.

Behind him he heard Sasha draw in a gasp so sharp it was almost a cry. He glanced up to see her whiter than he’d ever seen her, one hand reaching up towards her lips.

“You right, Sasha?” he said.

She swallowed. Then swallowed again and when her voice came out it was low and cracked with feeling.

“Brock?”


	14. Do It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sasha has history. Zolf has determination. Grizzop is Grizzop.

Zolf was just seeing his clients out the door when his phone buzzed in his pocket. He usually had it off during meetings - there was nothing so crass as a phone going off when you were attempting to talk about the proper way to deal with the body of a loved one - but today he’d been anxious enough to keep it with him, worrying about Sasha out in the van and the possibility of some sort of confrontation with whoever was sending Wilde the letters, worried about Grizzop and his propensity to trust them all so easily, worried about Wilde… 

Always.  _ Always worried about Wilde. _

Luckily the family were too preoccupied to notice the buzz against his leg as he murmured reassurances to them and walked them to the door. He tried not to fumble as he pulled it out and saw the text from Wilde.

_ Sash and Grizzop got him. Meet us at Landscaping when you can. _

He shoved the phone back in his pocket and grabbed his cane, then stopped and turned back to tell Cel where he was going.

“They got him?” Cel said. They were halfway through cleaning the preparation room, massive rubber gloves all the way up to their elbows.

“Yeah,” Zolf said. “I’ll let you know how it turns out?”

“Please,” Cel said, giving him an odd smile. 

"What?"

Cel sighed. "It'll be all right, Zolf."

He shifted his grip on his cane. “Well. Yeah. It will.” 

He thought he saw Cel roll their eyes and pretended not to understand why. “Shouldn’t be out long,” he said.

“I’ll man the fort,” they said. He hesitated a moment, but Cel waved their hand. “Go  _ on.” _

Meerk, one of the kobold casuals, was talking to a customer in the courtyard at the front of Four Seasons and looked up as Zolf went through the archway, swishing his tail. “They’re in the office,” he said, and Zolf nodded in gratitude, weaving his way through the various plant displays. If he had time he would have to come back, he thought to himself, there was something deeply calming about the displays, the gentle greenery of it felt almost magical.

Vesseek and Grizzop knew their plants.

He wasn’t exactly sure what he’d expected of the person who had been delivering the letters. He knew it wouldn’t be Barret himself, oh no Barret was very very careful never to get his hands anywhere near the dirt he so liberally spread around the town via his newspapers and television stations, so of course he would have employed someone else to actually thrust the vile things into Wilde’s hands, but to be face to face with the person who was his courier was… disappointing.

He’d expected to be angry. To be able to take out some of the frustrations he’d been harbouring for years now. Instead he was faced with Sasha standing in a corner, biting her fist while she looked with eyes wider than he’d ever seen at a kid - her age, maybe younger, who was sitting in Grizzop’s too-small office chair, knees pulled up almost to his chin, arms wrapped around them as he looked up at Grizzop and Wilde with large, frightened eyes. Grizzop was standing right next to him, arms crossed over his chest, Wilde was looking at the boy with an expression that was half amused, half … god knew what. 

Zolf cleared his throat and four heads whipped up and around to him at the same time.

“Uh…” Zolf started.

“Come in,” Grizzop said. “Don’t mind him. He’s just about to tell us exactly everything.”

“Grizzop…” Sasha said.

“I know you  _ know  _ him, Sasha, we’ve established that but it doesn’t mean that he can just walk away from what he’s been doing  _ have you even seen what’s in those letters?” _

“Of course I have! Who do you think found the first one? But it isn’t Brock’s fault,” she looked at Wilde, whose expression hadn’t changed. “You know what Barret’s like, Oscar, you know what they would have done if he didn’t do what he told him to, you  _ know…” _

“I’m not blaming Brock for any of this, Sasha,” Wilde said quietly.

It was a bit like walking in on one of those soap operas Cel liked. At least with a Harrison Campbell, Zolf would know all the backstory by now. “Anyone want to bring me up to speed here?” he said.

“Apparently this is an old friend of Sasha’s,” Grizzop said, biting back each word.

Sasha stepped forward and put a hand on the kid’s shoulder. Brock (at least Zolf assumed that was his name) shivered at the touch, shoulders slumping.

“I’m sorry, Sash,” he murmured. 

“Not me you should be apologising to, mate,” Sasha said.

“You were delivering the letters. For how long?” Grizzop asked.

“First one was what… six months ago?” Brock looked up at Wilde, who nodded grimly. 

“About that, yes.”

“He’s been amping it up, lately though. I dunno why. Wanted one every day these past few weeks. I knew…” the kid swallowed, looking up at Sasha again. “I knew I was pushing it but I didn’t expect you to be so  _ fast…” _

“Come on, Brock," Zolf had never heard tenderness in Sasha's voice before. "You should have known better.”

“Maybe I wanted to get caught,” Brock looked down again, voice going small.

Grizzop, who had been standing stock straight with his ear tips quivering the whole time, seemed to soften at that.

“What’s he got on you?” Grizzop asked. 

Brock shrugged. “It’s not that. He pays me. I don’t have… family or nothing. No place to go. He took us in, gave us work.”

“He told me you were gone,” Sasha said. “Said you were in Europe or something. Said you were doing fine over there.”

“Yeah, well. You know as well as I do he’s not big on the truth.”

“He runs a fucking newspaper,” Grizzop growled, and Wilde snorted, before taking a deep breath . 

“How much trouble are you going to be in, now that we know who you work for?”

Brock shrugged. “He doesn’t have to know that you know.”

“You’ll keep delivering the letters, keep working for him?”

Brock made a frustrated sound. “What else am I supposed to do?”

Wilde looked at Sasha, then at Zolf. 

Zolf sucked at his lip. Looked at the kid, then at Sasha, and at Wilde, and at Grizzop. 

At this point, what did it really matter?

“Can you drive, kid?” Zolf said. 

“Sure. Yeah.”

“Do you have a  _ license?”  _ Grizzop asked, more pointedly, and the boy flushed. 

“Yeah, I’ve got a license.”

“Good. Well I’ve been on the lookout for more staff for a while. You can come work at the crematorium for me, drive the hearse, my leg doesn’t hold up to it so much any more and Cel’s too busy with other things.”

“Wha… you don’t… why would you…”

“And you can stay with me,” Sasha said. “Not like we didn’t used to share a room any way, right? And Barret’s guys know not to mess around near my place.”

“I can’t just leave he’ll…”

“He’ll be angry, but when isn’t he?” Wilde said. “And I’ve got no doubt he’ll try to get to me in other ways, or just send someone else with the letters.”

“I can’t…”

“Wait,” Grizzop said. “Wait a minute. This is all wrong. We wanted to catch this guy so we could get the harassment to stop, right? So he’d leave you alone?”

Zolf looked at Wilde, who was looking at Grizzop, sadness writ plain on his face. “We always knew who was behind it, Grizzop,” he said.

“So, now we have proof!”

“One ex-street kid against the richest guy in the city?” Sasha said. “Come on Grizzop.”

“No. No this isn’t good enough. It’s not justice!”

“I don’t know about that,” Zolf said. “We’ve helped Brock. One more person out from under his influence.”

Grizzop’s chest was heaving. “All right. Fine. Yeah, that is a good thing, but he’s just going to keep hurting people, isn’t he? He’s gonna break the law and not suffer any consequences and he’s going to  _ keep hurting people.” _

Wilde spread his hands. “What more can we do, Grizzop?”

Grizzop almost snarled.  _ “We can take him down.” _

Sasha and Brock and Wilde all opened their mouths to speak at once, but Zolf was focused on Grizzop, on the set of his shoulders, on the tilt of his head, on the quivering of his ears. There was something about him that  _ spoke  _ to Zolf. That kindled something in his chest that he’d thought was dead and gone, with the navy, with Feryn, with everything. 

He stepped forward, took Wilde’s forearm in his, took a deep breath.

“Okay,” he said to Grizzop. “Let’s do it.”


	15. Red or White?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stage is set, so time for ... dinner and deviousness?

They stood looking at each other for a long moment, the passion and drive of Grizzop stretching it out for longer than Oscar would have thought possible, considering the enormity of the task ahead. 

“All right then,” he said, patting Zolf’s hand where it still rested on his arm. “That’s a very fine sentiment and you can consider me well and truly inspired, but we’re still left with a very real problem.”

“Being?” Sasha said, although her lip was twisted in a smile.

“How precisely are we going to do this?”

Grizzop, who didn’t look like something as inconsequential as  _ practicality  _ was going to stop him, tapped a foot, then pointed at Oscar. “I need you,” he said, and Oscar couldn’t help but lift an eyebrow at the tone in his voice. “Stop it, I mean I need to pick your brain, get all the details of everything that’s gone on, why you were fired, what information you have, what you  _ know  _ about Barret.”

Oscar glanced at Sasha, and Grizzop followed his gaze. “Fine. But not now, and not here. Sasha, you can take the rest of the day off, get Brock settled, just… keep out of sight and out of trouble.”

“Gotcha, boss.”

“I’m sure you’ve got work to catch up on as well,” Oscar looked at the others, still conscious of Zolf's hand on his arm, of the solid support of him. 

“Yeah, but…” Grizzop started.

“I’ve caused enough trouble for all of you for today at least. Grizzop if you’re free you can meet me at mine at closing time.”

“Why can’t you…”

He resisted the urge to fist his hands in his hair. “I don’t keep the evidence I gathered in the shop!” Oscar snapped. There was an awkward silence, in which Sasha rolled her eyes and Zolf just looked at him. “I’m not a complete idiot. It’s somewhere safe, I have to go fetch it.”

“You could just tell…”

Oscar shook his head, sighing. “If you really want the ins and outs and everything that’s happened you deserve to know it’s the truth.”

Grizzop still didn’t look happy, but he shrugged. “Fine,” he said. Sasha was helping Brock to his feet, even though he probably didn’t need it from the chair, and Zolf squeezed Oscar’s arm one more time before letting go.

“Be nice to yourself,” he murmured to Oscar, then focused on Sasha and Brock. “Before you go, lad, let me give you some details. You don’t need to start work right away but…”

Oscar watched as he walked with Sasha out of the office, the soft lilt of his accent washing over the kid with much the same effect it had on Oscar when he was in need of reassurance.

He swallowed, blinking back sudden pressure behind his eyes, then glanced back down at Grizzop who was watching him with a very knowing expression.

“You going to give me your address then, Wilde?” he asked. “I’ll bring us some food.”

“Not Mexican, please,” Oscar said, automatically, and Grizzop smirked. 

“Wouldn’t want to upset your delicate stomach. I’m assuming Zolf knows all of this already?”

Oscar nodded, shortly, remembering a drunken night, determined to make the grumpy, oddly endearing dwarf who was most of his contact with the outside world these days forgive him for his initial dickishness. Remembering the soft look of pity in his eyes as the story had unfolded. “We’re a tight little conspiracy, here on State Road, Grizzop.”

He gave Oscar a tight smile. “I’ll be there at seven,” he said.

Oscar started back towards his shop. “Do you prefer white or red?” he called over his shoulder.

“I’m not getting drunk with you, Wilde.”

“You’re  _ no fun at all.” _

Oscar’s apartment was further away from the shop than was strictly convenient, on the north side of town overlooking a small-ish park. It was a little more expensive than was strictly practical, but he had some savings and the remnants of his father’s inheritance (the small amount his brother hadn’t managed to gamble away) and so he justified the expense, despite the more practical recesses of his mind screeching about the uncertainty of his current income.

_ People are always going to want to get off,  _ he’d justified to himself, many times now, when the rent checks were due and the books hadn’t quite been balanced.

He hadn’t been wrong, yet.

He let himself in, climbing the three short flights up to his apartment holding two bottles of wine (one white, one red). Grizzop had said he didn’t want to get drunk, but there was a strong possibility that Oscar  _ did,  _ and he liked to keep his options open.

He didn’t know that he wanted to approach this conversation entirely sober, in any case, just the thought of it was making him clench his jaw hunch his shoulders.

He pottered around the apartment for a little while, switching on a podcast (he steered well away from anything news related, these days, preferring serialised fiction, or the odd improvised comedy) as he tidied laundry and cleaned leftover dishes.

When he couldn’t put it off any more, he went to the safe.

_ There wasn’t enough.  _

_ It’s your word against theirs. _

He’d been foolish, thinking that his word was enough.

He’d been foolish, putting trust into institutions that were supposed to serve the public, not control them. 

He spread his papers out on his small, round coffee table, soft, classical music over his speakers, podcast gone. He’d given into temptation and opened the white, half a glass in, the edge of nervousness receding when the buzz came at his apartment door.

Grizzop drik acht Amsterdam was a hellishly handsome goblin, Oscar had time to think as he walked up the stairs behind him to his apartment. It really wasn’t fair, he’d often thought to himself, how many beautiful people there were in this world. Sasha had scoffed at him when he’d complained about it, though. “You find everyone attractive,” she’d pointed out and he had to acknowledge that was part of it. There always,  _ always  _ something to be found that one could consider attractive even when…

… well. It was usually okay in the moment, at least. But Grizzop had proved himself to be more than just the extremely nicely shaped behind, encased in jeans rather than his usual work pants, more than just the starkly outlined muscles of his rangy back and arms encased in a black t-shirt that Oscar would have guessed was bought before said muscles reached their current level of… buff-ness, more than… 

“Which is yours?” Grizzop asked, interrupting his reverie, stopped at the fork in the stairway, and Oscar had to wrench his head back upwards to Grizzop’s face, blinking the fuzziness from his head. 

Possibly it hadn’t been a good idea to start the wine before Grizzop had got here.

“Five,” he said, proud that his voice, at least, didn’t squeak. “On the left.”

Grizzop turned left and stood at the door while Oscar unlocked it, pushing it open and letting him walk inside in front of him, burdened as Grizzop was with two plastic bags full of something that smelled absolutely divine… or maybe that was the goblin himself, who smelled of fresh forests and earth and leather. 

Leather?

Oscar obviously hadn’t been laid in  _ months,  _ and it was starting to get to him, and he probably shouldn’t have invited Grizzop here in the first place, already broken open and vulnerable because he was going to have to  _ tell him… _

“Wilde?”

He sucked in a breath through his nose. “Right. Sorry. Kitchen’s through here. We can get plates and things. That smells delightful, something middle eastern?”

“It’s an Egyptian place, Hamid recommended it,” Grizzop said, following him into the kitchen. “You said no Mexican but I’m not going anything without  _ some  _ flavour.”

“It’s not the spice that’s the problem,” Oscar said, smiling a little, “also you never said if you liked red or white.”

“I’m more of a beer person,” Grizzop said.

“Oh, well, luckily…” Oscar kept some beer in the fridge, mainly because Zolf liked it, and fetched out a bottle of something local brewed that had a fancy label on it - almost certainly made by a pair of guys too young to sport their enormous beards in a homebrew setup next to their gaming rig in their basement. He handed it over to Grizzop before gathering plates and cutlery for the frankly astonishing array of beautiful dishes that Grizzop was opening.

His stomach gave a growl, and he flashed back guiltily to the breakfast he’d not eaten, the two mouthfuls of ramen he’d managed to force down at lunch, and glanced at Grizzop, whose ears were slanted as he looked right back at him.

“Zolf said you didn’t eat enough,” he said, putting the last of the plastic containers down on Oscar’s tiny dining room table. “Eat up, Wilde, then we can concentrate on business.”

Oscar poured himself another glass of wine and sat at the table, too hungry now to glare at Grizzop the way he wanted, touched by the fact that Zolf had cared enough to let Grizzop know his eating habits (and infuriated at the same time, he couldn’t forget that over the rising tide of warmth in his gut), and spooned food onto his plate.

It was, as had been promised by the smells, utterly delicious, and there wasn’t much conversation as they ate, Grizzop making his way through his beer and another and Oscar having another glass of wine. It was surprisingly easy, being here with Grizzop. The goblin didn’t ask intrusive questions or make idle conversation. He wasn’t, Oscar realised, one to be afraid of silences.

Oscar had had to train himself out of that, else working with Sasha would very quickly become unbearable, being friends with Zolf an ordeal.

He had, he realised, after a youth of almost excessive talking, surrounded himself with people who hated to waste a single word.

There _was_ always Cel, of course, although their employment had been a fairly recent development and after some misunderstood flirting, degenerated into friendly awkwardness, in itself utterly different from nearly every past casual relationship from his former life.

They finished their meal, Grizzop neatly sealing up the leftovers (less of these than Oscar had anticipated, given the sheer amount of food he had brought) and putting them into Oscar’s mostly bare fridge, and drying plates that Oscar washed.

“It’s a nice place you have,” Grizzop said, finally.

“Thank you,” Oscar said, surprised at how much the simple compliment meant. 

“Very you,” Grizzop continued.

Oscar laughed. “You think so?” 

Grizzop’s ears twitched. “I mean I didn’t think you were going to decorate it with sex toys or nothing,” he said. 

“No, for those, the aesthetic at the very least is strictly business for me.”

“The aesthetic?”

“The actual toys are actually a lot of fun. I can’t do good recommendations without trying them first, after all.” He waggled his eyebrows at Grizzop, expecting the goblin to roll his eyes and shake it off, but instead delighted to see a flush of green under his skin. Oscar felt a small thrill at that, which was quickly dispelled when Grizzop hopped down from the stool he’d been using to reach Oscar’s sink and wiped his hands on a tea towel.

“Right then,” he said. “Shall we get on with it?”

Oscar sighed and poured himself another glass of wine.


	16. What We Needed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop and Wilde reach an understanding.

“So all this paperwork is well and good but you’re just going to tell me what happened, right? I don’t have to read it myself?”

Wilde sat on the couch in front of the coffee table strewn with papers and folders and glanced up at Grizzop, a lock of hair falling over one of his eyes. 

“Can’t be telling you all the sordid details without the evidence to back it up, now, can I?”

Grizzop crossed his arms over his chest. “Well?”

Wilde reached out and picked up a photograph - it was easy enough to recognise who it was. Impossible not to, really, considering the amount of air time he’d gotten in the past few years. 

“Bertrand Macguffingham,” Wilde said, sighing. 

“You know him?”

“Oh, my dear Grizzop. I know him intimately." Grizzop made a face and Wilde flashed him a grin that could only be described as cheeky. "Don’t look like that he’s very charismatic in his own way.”

“I doubt he’d get the chance to be charismatic near me.”

“Fair enough, given his views, and I certainly wouldn’t move to defend him from any righteous justice you felt inclined to execute upon him.”

“So you were lovers?”

“For a little while, yes. I won’t say my motivation for it was pure, I’m afraid. We met for an interview, one thing led to another and…”

Grizzop sat on the couch near Wilde, looking at the photo. Bertrand Macguffingham was one of those people who took up  _ space,  _ and unfortunately he took up space in people’s heads even when he wasn’t anywhere near them. A low level local council member, propped up by a well known and wealthy family until a few years ago, when he’d been elected to congress.

“Bertie Macguffingham likes to talk in bed. Over the course of a… mmmm… six week relationship he let drop that he’d been accepting bribes from certain folks ‘associated’ with Barret in order to further their agenda in the political arena.”

“He told you that?”

Wilde smiled and shrugged. “Not in so many words, you understand - he is  _ not _ a subtle man. But there were enough hints and leads for me to start asking more subtle people the right questions.” He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “I’d only been working for Barret a few months - the paper changing hands was a shock for all of us, and, well. I did a lot of digging. Uncovered some questionable reasons behind the takeover, as well as a few other clear violations of journalistic ethics.”

“So you took it to the authorities?”

“Not immediately.” Wilde smiled, and the smile was fond. “First of all I enlisted the help of Barret’s closest relative.”

Grizzop blinked. “Oh?”

“Ms Sasha Racket.”

“Sasha  _ Racket?” _

“She’s his niece. Niece and legal ward - technically his heir although I suspect he’s trying to find ways to get around that now.”

“And she helped you?”

Wilde grinned, leaning back on the couch and stretching out his arms. One of his hands, Grizzop did  _ absolutely not notice  _ brushed against his ear as it settled on the couch behind him. “She did. She didn’t live with Barret her whole life as you might have gleaned from… well. Her skillset.”

Grizzop smiled a little at that. “I wondered.”

"She wasn't a big fan of the restrictions her new guardian was putting on her, and on some of her friends - poor Brock for one - but there were others. Barret has a habit of using people. Vulnerable people, mostly, although when it comes down to it we're all vulnerable to the kind of power he wields."

"So she helped you get more dirt on Barret?"

"She was my inside source.Had access to his private records. He always had a blind spot when it came to Sasha which worked in our advantage, although in the long run it probably made his revenge against me a little more punitive than it needed to be."

"You got evidence?"

Wilde indicated the paperwork on the table. "To me, it felt like enough. But."

“But.”

“The police are on his payroll. The congressional seat is in the hands of Macguffingham. And a well timed newspaper article about some of my more questionable past indulgences of a sexual nature were enough to get me fired from the newspaper in disgrace.” 

"Past indulgences?" 

Wilde spread his hands. "I have slept with some people who weren't above talking to the press. I don't blame them. I know that Barret paid them very well for their stories. Some of them were even true."

The lamplight was low and the fall of Wilde’s hair across his cheek masked the pink glow of it until he glanced up at Grizzop, the photo of Macguffingham still in his fingers, a wry twist to his full lips. Grizzop’s ears dipped, his heart a mess of sympathy for Wilde, for Zolf, for every bloody person in this sorry city who felt trapped and helpless against Barret and the systems that allowed him to operate with impunity.

“I’m sorry,” he said, knowing the words were useless, but wanting to do something, anything at all to mitigate the sadness he could feel rolling off Wilde like a wave. 

Wilde let out a soft sigh and leaned forward to put the photo back on the pile of papers, shifting a little as he did, knee touching Grizzop’s briefly as he moved, breath ghosting over Grizzop’s ear. He hadn’t  _ had  _ to put the photo exactly back where it had been in the pile of papers, but now when he settled back against the couch he was inches closer than he had been and Grizzop could feel the heat from him on his skin.

Grizzop swallowed. It was impossible not to notice that Wilde had been flirting with him - since the day they met, actually, although he’d figured it was just the way he was with everyone - but this was different. This was dinner and wine and vulnerability and a shared purpose, and this was the point where he couldn’t deny that he found the man beautiful.

He turned on the sofa so he was facing Wilde, who was judiciously  _ not  _ looking back at Grizzop, but still at the table. Grizzop reached up and cupped his chin, tilting his face towards him, twitching an ear at the glint in Wilde’s eyes as they fell on his own.

Wilde’s eyes dropped to Grizzop’s lips and he shifted again, further forward to press his mouth to Grizzop’s, lightly, tentatively, then with more confidence and a good deal of skill that had Grizzop’s breath coming faster and his heart hammering at his ribs in just a few, short seconds.

He let himself drift in it, for those seconds, before pulling back, claw digging slightly into Wilde’s cheek. That  _ might  _ have been a mistake, because at the pressure of it Wilde let out a soft moan that did nothing to make what Grizzop was going to say any easier.

“That’s… that’s very nice, Wilde,” he said. “But…” Wilde pulled back immediately on that word, lips twisted in disappointment. He made as though to shove himself away from Grizzop but Grizzop reached out and gripped his arm, claws digging in a little. “Hey, I hadn’t finished.”

“You said  _ but,”  _ Wilde said, although he stopped trying to pull away. “In my experience  _ but  _ is always followed by a list of reasons I should not be doing what I’m doing, and also in my experience, said reasons are usually good ones. My apologies.”

“I mean you’re not wrong,” Grizzop said, but he tried to keep the tone kind. “There’s a lot wrong with us banging right now when you think about it.”

Wilde laughed, a bitter sound, and raised his hand to count off on his fingers “I’m a deadbeat sex shop proprietor with no future…”

“As if that matters to me.”

“I’ve had three glasses…”

“... four if you count the one you had before I got here…”

“ _ Four  _ glasses of wine, revealed to you the dark secret in the heart of my past and I’m actually only throwing myself at you in a desperate attempt to feel something other than helplessness and despair. Were those the ones you were going to list?”

“The last one is the only good one on the list and if it’s true then I hope I would have been able to pick up on it better.”

“Would it help if I told you I do not make a habit of having sex as a substitute for therapy?”

“Actually yes.”

“Even though you caught me making out with Ed in your party kitchen?”

_ “Someone  _ was going to make out with Ed in my party kitchen, you just happened to get in first, and as far as I know you didn’t fuck in there.” He paused for a second, considering.  _ “Please _ tell me you didn’t fuck in there.”

“We didn’t fuck in there.”

“Were you using him as a substitute for therapy?”

“He was a distraction.”

“So sex is a distraction for you, then.”

“Sometimes, yes.”

“Am I a distraction?”

Wilde's eyes were wide and beautiful and fixed on Grizzop's face. “An utterly delectable one, Grizzop,” Wilde said, and Grizzop couldn’t help the little catch in his breath at that. 

There was a drawn out silence between them that felt, to Grizzop, charged enough to ignite. “You missed one of the reasons, Wilde,” he said, finally.

“Oh?”

Grizzop tilted his head. “You’re in love with somebody else.”

Wilde looked at him. Grizzop had been with a few people in his day - he wasn’t what he would have called… prolific when it came to lovers, but the expression on Wilde’s face was so utterly tender, so very knowing and understanding, that he felt his stomach flip as though he was a kid again.

There was just something about Oscar Wilde, he had time to think, before the man leaned forward so his voice tickled the inside of Grizzop’s ear.

“My dearest Grizzop,” he said, and  _ oh, _ Wilde  _ knew  _ what he liked, or maybe he knew goblins, or maybe he just knew  _ this  _ so much better than Grizzop did “so are you.”

Grizzop had a million things he could say in response to that, but somehow, he was kissing Wilde again, shifting so he was sitting in the man’s lap, hands moving up to catch in his hair. Wilde’s hands cupped his ass and shifted him closer, nipping at Grizzop’s lips and then along his jaw to suck at the soft skin behind his ear. 

“Not a fan of being just a distraction,” he managed to gasp out.

“You could never be  _ just  _ anything,” Wilde said back, and it should have been cheesy and it  _ should  _ have been stupid but it was sincere and coupled with a squeeze of Wilde’s hands and a tease of Wilde’s tongue over his skin and Grizzop decided that propriety and patience were virtues that could fucking go someplace else for the next twenty or so minutes.

He tugged at Wilde’s shirt, not wanting to break the next kiss that found his lips and Wilde made short work of his buttons. Grizzop shoved the shirt off his shoulders, squirming so he could get his mouth on Wilde’s collarbones, delighting in the surprised cry that a nip of his teeth drew from him, feeling his cock throb when Wilde let out a breathless  _ “Grizzop…”  _ when his mouth found a nipple.

“What,” he asked, without looking up, without losing focus as he sucked and nipped down to the waist of Wilde’s trousers.

A breathless laugh from above him. “Absolutely nothing. Please… ah…  _ please carry on.” _

Grizzop smiled against the skin of Wilde’s hip and busied himself with his belt, stripping Wilde’s trousers from him enough to expose his cock. Gods it was beautiful, elegant and full and eager. He grasped it with one hand and looked up to see Wilde staring down at him, lips parted, eyes swallowed by black. 

Grizzop grinned, enjoying the flash of excitement in Wilde’s face as he opened his mouth and took him in.

_ Wilde made the prettiest noises. _

Grizzop wasn’t one to take his time in bed, but the way Wilde writhed and moaned under him made him  _ want  _ to slow down, to fill his ears with those noises as they tripped from his lips. A hand found one of his ears as he worked Wilde deeper into his mouth and Grizzop groaned around him, clever fingers stroking and fingering the rings and making him palm his own cock through his jeans.

“Fuck.  _ Fuck yes there…”  _ Wilde’s other hand was gripping the couch, and Grizzop reached up to take it in his, lacing his fingers with the man’s while he worked his mouth faster.  _ “I’m…  _ You keep doing that and I’ll…”

Grizzop squeezed his hand and swallowed down and Wilde let out a shuddering cry as he came. 

Grizzop pulled off, wiping his mouth and grinning again at Wilde, looking debauched, trousers still half on, shirt messed up behind him, breath heaving. “Good?” he asked.

Wilde still had enough composure to raise an eyebrow, and Grizzop felt his eyes narrow. “Cmere,” Wilde said, reaching for his belt.

Grizzop helped him pull off his jeans and Wilde maneuvered him so he was literally sitting on the man’s shoulders. His cock bobbed in front of Wilde’s face and Wilde looked utterly filthy as he reached out with his tongue to give it a teasing lick, Grizzop’s head tipped down so he could watch the movement of his tongue, see the flush of his cheeks and the strands of his hair stuck to his cheeks.

One large, strong hand splayed over Grizzop’s ass and pulled him close, and for a short, frantic, glorious time Grizzop’s mind went utterly blank with pleasure.

When he was done he flopped back on the couch, breath heaving, Wilde’s fingers tracing patterns on his stomach. They were both a mess at this point, sweaty and sticky, but Wilde was smiling and Grizzop felt more at home and comfortable in Wilde’s presence than he had since the moment he’d got there.

A good fuck would do that for him, apparently.

“Is that…” Wilde said, breath still coming a little short. “Is that what you needed?”

Grizzop laughed. “Fuck yes,” he said. 

Wilde flopped his head in his direction. “Thank you,” he said, softly. His fingers gripped Grizzop’s hip a little tighter. “You…” he swallowed. Licked his lips. “You can stay if you want.”

Grizzop covered Wilde’s hand with his and brought it to his lips. “Sure,” he said. “I’d like that.”


	17. Impatience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We all fucking hate therapy, right? BUT IT DOES US GOOD.

Zolf didn’t want to be here, but that was par for the course every Thursday evening and he had gotten to the point where he could force himself to get out of the car any way. Routine was important with things like these. If he drove here automatically every Thursday, if he didn’t think about why he was coming or what he would have to do what he got here, then he could manage not to be anxious about it. Thursdays were a regular, ordinary day, because he forced himself to make them that way.

The lift up to Azu’s practice was a tiny thing, barely enough room to fit three humans, and it wasn’t unheard of for Zolf to have to wait a few rounds to get in and ride it to the seventh floor. Today, however, the building was relatively empty, and he only had to share it with one other gnomish woman who barely glanced at him as he stomped inside, leaning heavily on his cane.

Azu’s waiting room was heavily decorated with the pinks she liked and Zolf always felt awkward sitting on the couch, but at least today there were no other clients waiting to see the other counsellors. Her receptionist, Tak, was a goblin and frighteningly efficient in that way Zolf had come to expect from goblins, and greeted him. He was a couple of minutes early, so he sat on the ridiculous pink couch and eyed the stack of magazines on the coffee table. Azu at least didn’t favour gossip magazines, but Zolf had little interest in the glossy art and lifestyle kind she favoured, although his eye was caught by a gardening one, and he smiled a little to himself thinking of how the simple act of making an acquaintance in a field made that field more interesting. He was just reaching for the largest of the gardening magazines when Azu poked her head out her door and smiled at him.

“Come in, Zolf,” she said, and he stopped himself from sucking his bottom lip between his teeth, set the magazine down on the table, and followed her into her room.

He hated this.

He knew why he hated it, and he didn’t hold it against Azu. He’d been with so many therapists, since he left the military, and he’d not even had a choice of them at first. There’d been the discussions of loss about his leg (he’d never cared about the fucking leg) and they’d inevitably linked into discussions about his brother and he still didn’t know how to make people understand that the two things weren’t connected. You could lose one thing and then you could lose another. They didn’t have to meet - it wasn’t like they lined up and took turns. They could both hurt you from different directions, like two bullies and four fists. One of them might pause to rub their knuckles, take a breath, eat some oranges, but in the meantime the other one would just keep on punching you in the fucking face.

No relief. 

“How’re you feeling?” Azu asked.

That was a regular starting question. And Zolf was getting better at answering those with more honesty.

“Anxious,” he said. “Wound up.”

Azu nodded. “That’s pretty normal for you, though, isn’t it? But you don’t usually mention it. Is something in particular bothering you?”

Zolf took a breath. “Yes,” he said. “But it’s not something I can really talk about.”

Azu tilted her head. “You’re worrying about other people again.”

He shrugged. Tried for a smile. “It’s a thing,” he said.

“A thing you do,” Azu echoed his own words, smiling. “You know I’ll never ask you to give me details you’re not comfortable with. But we’ve been working on how you can understand there is only so much you can do to help.”

Zolf sucked in a breath. “I know it’s not my job,” he said. “I know I can’t fix it for them.”

Azu smiled. “But you can’t stop trying,” she said. “And that’s okay. It really is, Zolf. You can’t stop yourself from being you, but you do need to not let… “ Azu sucked in a breath, then let it out slowly. “Sometimes things will go wrong. And they’re not your fault.”

Zolf knew that was what he needed to hear. But he also knew he couldn’t accept it. 

“Sometimes they are my fault, though,” he said. “What do I do about that?”

Azu, damn her, knew him too well. “Is this thing, the thing you don’t want to talk about, is this particular thing, your fault, Zolf?” she was smiling a little, because she thought she knew the answer.

“Yes,” he said, and that wasn’t the answer she was expecting, and it showed in her stare. But to give her credit, she didn’t dismiss it, just continued to fix him with her wide, beautiful, dark eyes. “Yes it is,” he would double down on this one.

“Why?” she asked.

_ Because I’ve never told him how I feel. Because we’ve stayed here and we could have left. Because it’s not his responsibility any more than it’s mine. Because… _

_ Because… _

Azu was watching him, her eyes calm and her hands folded in her lap.

“He…”  _ is meeting up with Grizzop tonight and I know they’ll hit it off. _

_ He drives me absolutely mad but I can’t stop thinking about him. _

_ I don’t even know what love is but I know I can’t bear the thought of life away from him. _

“I…”

Azu handed him a glass of water. She never touched him, in session, and that was fine, but the act was enough for the tears that were crowding behind his lids to seep out as he squeezed his eyes shut and sipped, trying to stop himself from showing something he knew she could see more plainly than daylight. 

He gulped down the water and set the glass next to him. 

“Let’s move to a topic that’s more comfortable for you,” Azu said, and the tears threatened again, just from relief and gratitude. “Any more grief about your disability pension? You know I’ve got some contacts and I can…”

There was a reason he kept coming to Azu. She knew his limits, and she pushed them, but in the end he came away able to deal just that little bit better, and in the end, wasn’t that all that mattered?

He hoped Grizzop and Wilde were having a far more pleasant evening.


	18. Well That Happened

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Grizzop and Wilde are compatible, but talking is still a problem apparently.

Oscar woke with a soft weight of goblin in his arms. It was, without a doubt, his most pleasant awakening in months, to feel the gentle tickle of Grizzop’s ear under his chin as he breathed, the warmth of his skin against Oscar’s chest, one clawed hand spread over his stomach, the other tucked up under his arm. 

He didn’t exactly have a hangover - the wine he’d drunk had been over a long period and he’d certainly over-indulged far more than that in his day, but his mouth was dry and he needed the bathroom and he really  _ really  _ should be getting himself organised for the trip back in to the store, but for a moment, at least, he was content to stay precisely where he was, watching the morning light play over the deep grey of Grizzop’s skin, delighting in seeing the curve of his eyelashes resting on the planes of his cheeks.

He was utterly relaxed, completely loose in Oscar’s arms and Oscar cradled him, and the moment, to himself, as something utterly precious. He wanted to preserve it in amber, make it something tangible that he could treasure no matter what the next day, the next hour, the next breath might bring.

It was a talent, keeping these moments like gems in his hoard, polishing them and cutting them off from all the bad things that surrounded them. 

Because if he didn’t, they would be spoiled.

He traced a light finger along the length of Grizzop’s ear, remembering how his eyes had gone dark and he’d shuddered when he’d done that last night, remembering the feel of his lips around his cock, the salty taste of him in Oscar’s mouth, the scrape of his claws in Oscar’s hair…

Mmm. Well. He probably shouldn’t be thinking about that right now, if he didn’t want Grizzop to wake up with an erection poking at him. On the other hand, maybe Grizzop would be amenable to another round… or perhaps…

The ear he was tracing flicked and one red eye slitted open, looking up at Oscar blearily. Oscar’s hand froze, hovering over the ear, daring to give Grizzop a salacious smile.

“Don’t have to stop,” Grizzop murmured. “‘Snice.” 

Oh  _ ho.  _ His smile widened and he continued to stroke up and down the ear, moving his other hand across Grizzop’s shoulder and down his back, tracing the knots of his spine. Grizzop gave a delightful shiver and rocked his hips forward against Oscar’s side, and Oscar could feel the line of his cock slowly thickening where it touched his skin.

It was a lazy thing in the end, Oscar pulling Grizzop up so he was sitting astride him, Grizzop rocking his cock against Oscar’s, not quite slick enough with just sweat, until Oscar reached the bottle of lube in his nightstand, and their hands encircled their cocks, soft moans and gentle movements becoming more frantic until they both spilled across Oscar’s stomach, Grizzop slumping forward into the mess they created, breathing hard and laughing softly under his breath.

“What’s so funny?” Oscar said.

“Sex is always funny,” Grizzop said, shifting a little. There was an unpleasant sound, somewhere between a slurp and a suck as sweat and other things moved between their bodies. 

Oscar made a face. “And sticky,” he said. “Time for a shower.”

Grizzop flopped off Oscar and onto his back. “You can go first,” he said, and Oscar eyed him. He’d flung his arms above his head and was wriggling back into Oscar’s pillows, looking for all the world like he was intending to go back to sleep.

It was impossibly endearing.

“You don’t mind the mess?”

Grizzop chuckled again, closing his eyes. “Wilde I work in  _ gardens,  _ I’m used to being covered in worse things than spunk.”

“Well I’m glad we got the sex out of the way before you started referring to things you’ve been smeared with,” Oscar said. “Could have really ruined the mood.” Grizzop swatted at him lazily. 

“Go clean your lily-white skin, princess,” he said. “I’mma get ten more minutes sleep.”

Oscar was still smiling as he stepped into the shower, more relaxed than he’d been in months. Grizzop was a delightful bed partner and excellent company even when he didn’t have his cock down Oscar’s throat, and he allowed himself a few minutes of pleasant daydreaming as he smoothed soap over his skin and breathed in the steam from the hot water. Domesticity had never been his thing, but he liked the concept of it - he could make Grizzop coffee and drive them both into work, watch him from he window of the Ride as he shifted fertiliser shirtless in the hot sun, perhaps corner him in the office when Vesseek was out on a job and fuck away the drudgery of paperwork and customers…

It was harmless day dreaming, something he refused to feel guilty about, the possibility of a normal relationship, sex and companionship and mutual trust…

It didn’t have to be love. But maybe it even could be, love wasn’t, after all, something confined to the pages of a Harrison Campbell novel, all grand declarations and selfless devotion and epic romance. Love could be a quiet morning with a friend, lazy sex in the afternoon, a teasing conversation with your neighbour over mis-delivered mail…

Oscar shut his eyes and rested his head on the tiles of the shower, willing himself to ignore the prickling behind his eyes.  _ You’re in love with someone else. _

But what did that mean, really?

He got out of the shower, probably having taken too long, and wrapped a towel around himself. Grizzop wasn’t in the bed when he opened the door and he had a sudden, lurching fear that he’d up and left having gotten whatever it was he wanted out of Wilde. It wasn’t that he’d never experienced that before with a lover, although it was more usual for Wilde to be the one doing the leaving, but there were more feelings tied up around this particular liaison, entanglements with his past and his present, and the relief he felt when he heard Grizzop calling his name from the kitchen was so intense he felt, for a moment, weak at the knees.

“You got anything other than decaf coffee in this house, Wilde?”

“Give me a moment,” he said, pulling on pants and a shirt - he didn’t bother to button the shirt and padded out to the kitchen barefoot. Grizzop was standing in his underwear peering into his cupboard and it took a lot of willpower not to run his hand over the curve of his ass.

“You’re looking in the wrong spot,” Wilde said, and Grizzop looked over his shoulder at him, flicking an ear at the unbuttoned shirt. “Did you want to have a shower or are you going to wallow in our stink for the day?”

“I was gonna get coffee first but since I can’t find it, sure, I’ll get wet.”

“How do you like it?”

Grizzop grinned. “Thought you’d already worked that one out.”

“Hilarious.”

“I know. I’m brilliant. White and one sugar, if you’re going to make me coffee. Otherwise I’ll get one on the way to work.”

Wilde reached up over the top of Grizzop to bring down the beans, ready to set them in the grinder as he switched his espresso machine on. Grizzop made a grudgingly impressed face. “Of course you’re a fucking gormet,” he said.

“Would you expect anything less?” Wilde said.

“Shouldn’t have,” Grizzop replied, then disappeared into the bathroom.

The rhythm of grinding the beans and making the coffee settled the nervous energy that had been building in him since the shower and by the time Grizzop emerged, damp and fresh and dressed in the same clothes as the night before, Oscar was more or less back to normal, cupping his coffee in his hands and indicating to Grizzop the cup he’d made for him on the kitchen table.

Grizzop’s eyes were too large, and far too intelligent, and far too fixed on his face as he sipped his cup.

“So I think I can help you more than I already have,” Grizzop said, and Oscar blinked.

“More than…?” 

Grizzop flashed him a brief grin, but shook his head. “Yeah well, that’s definitely on the table if you’re up for it again but I mean with the other problem.”

Oscar set his cup on the table and spread his hands out. “I didn’t sleep with you as an exchange, Grizzop,” he said.

“Fuck no,” Grizzop said, still grinning. “It was fun, and as I said, totally up for it again, but I offered my services as… well. I have experience as a PI. And I know people in the business. You’re right, the evidence you have isn’t enough, but there’s no way in hell you’re the only person Barret is doing this to, you know that yeah?”

Oscar knew he was arrogant, but Grizzop’s plain question hit him broadside and left him staggering. “What.”

Grizzop blinked. “Look I don’t want to burst your bubble or anything, Wilde. You’re… pretty good? I mean you’re hot and from what I’ve read you’re good at writing and you did some stuff before Barret decided he wanted to take you down, but you’re just one guy, and Barret has a lot of money and resources and there’s no way you’re his only enemy…”

Oscar held up a hand. “Please, Grizzop, I don’t think my ego can take any more of this.”

Grizzop shrugged. “What I’m saying, is that this isn’t a one person thing, and trying to get him through just your stuff is the reason why it failed.”

“You think…”

“We can find enough people he hurt, get them all together, get them coordinated, and then we could take him out.”

Oscar blinked, his brain going into hysterical flatlines of absurdity.  _ Am I the Assole? My goblins, elf, dwarf and humans are unionising _ . “How?”

“I’ve done this sort of thing for years, Wilde,” Grizzop said. “And in the end… well. My old boss can probably help us way better than I can.”

“Your old boss?”

Grizzop nodded, downed the rest of his coffee, and set the cup down with a decisive thunk. “She’s expensive, but she’s good. We need to go and see Artemis.”


	19. Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More talk, some work. Grizzop knows what he likes and what he wants. So does Oscar, but that doesn't mean he's gonna articulate it, does it?

It was nice, waking up to sex and good coffee and conversation. He and Vesseek had tried it a few times over the years, the sex aspect, but in the end they weren’t really that into each other physically, and Vesseek was aromantic, something Grizzop knew he  _ wasn’t.  _ They’d muddled it all out in the end, the most important lesson Grizzop taking from it that it was important to be up front and honest about these things. Dancing around feelings never did anyone any good, which was why, on the drive back into work, he fixed his gaze on Oscar’s long fingered, elegant hands on the steering wheel and swallowed.

“So we should talk about us banging,” he said.

He could see Wilde’s knuckles turn briefly white on the wheel and a small strangled sound escaped his throat. When he spoke, however, his tone was so practiced and casual that Grizzop felt something shift in him - he’d not thought Oscar was vulnerable in this particular way, but it made perfect fucking sense, really, when you thought about it. “Oh? Did you have some criticisms of my technique?”

Grizzop took a breath, then made a decision, reaching across and putting one hand on Wilde’s knee, squeezing it just enough for his claws to prick against skin.

“No,” he said decisively. “I’m not ever gonna say it was a bad idea, Wilde, just want you to know that.” 

Wilde shifted his leg, just a little, but it was towards Grizzop’s hand and not away. 

“That’s good to know,” he said softly. “Is this a precursor for you saying you don’t want it to happen again?”

“Also no,” Grizzop said. “I reckon I could teach you a thing or two.”  There was a short, surprised laugh from Wilde at that and Grizzop grinned. “But I wanted to make sure you’re okay with it. With what we did and… I dunno the possibility of it happening again.”

“I’m enthusiastic about the prospect,” Wilde said, glancing at him and waggling his eyebrows.

“Good,” Grizzop said. “I didn’t want to step on your toes or anything, or mess up what you’ve got with Zolf. Vesseek’s fine with it we’re not really into the sex thing, at least not with each other and I…”

“Hang on…” Wilde was frowning now, “what do you mean?”

“Which part?”

He saw Wilde’s throat move as he swallowed. “What do you mean  _ what I’ve got with Zolf?” _

“I mean, you’re in love with him, right? And he obviously has a thing for you as well and if you’re exclusive or whatever I don’t want to mess it…”

“Hold up, hold up hold  _ up…” _

Wilde was breathing faster, and obviously distracted by driving, and Grizzop sucked in a breath, connecting those last few dots in his brain as he watched Wilde all but panic at the prospect that he might  _ have something with Zolf. _

Grizzop wished he could say he was surprised. “So you haven’t talked about it with him, huh,” he said. “Kind of figured.”

“I can’t… what would… okay just give me a second here…”

Wilde was focused back on the road as they merged onto the highway, picking up speed. Once they were safely on their way he took another deep breath. 

“You’re worried about  _ Zolf _ not being okay with me sleeping with you?”

Grizzop sighed. “Look I get that it can be complicated but you really should just tell him how you feel and then you can work out what to do about it.”

“We did just fuck this morning right? I didn’t dream that?”

Grizzop laughed. “Sex isn’t as important as everyone thinks it is, Wilde.”

The laugh that Wilde let out was delighted and Grizzop’s heart lurched dangerously in his chest. “You know, I’ve been saying that for  _ years.  _ Good thing no one listens, though, or I’d be out of a job.”

“So you’ve not talked to Zolf about this thing you have then,” Grizzop said, after a few moments of silence.

Wilde made a sound that could have been frustration. “How would I even start?” he asked. “We’ve been friends for years. I don’t… I wouldn’t even know how to approach it.”

“Hey, Zolf, I think you’re great and I’d like to…”

“He’s not into relationships,” Wilde said quickly, before Grizzop could finish what he was going to say.

“And you know that how?” It was almost comical, how Wilde gaped like a fish. “Come on, Wilde, you know everyone does this kind of thing differently.”

“You’re an ex private detective, a landscape artist  _ and  _ a relationship guru now?” Wilde said weekly. “What do you do in your  _ spare  _ time?”

“Bully my friends,” Grizzop said, and Wilde laughed again. 

“Well, I feel honored that you see me as a friend, then, but please, I don’t… need advice about Zolf. About Zolf and  _ me.” _

Grizzop made a noncommittal sound.

They were silent until Wilde pulled off the highway and they started down State Road towards Four Seasons and Wilde Ride. He pulled into the one space allocated for Wilde Ride and got out, leaning on the door as he waited for Grizzop to follow. 

“You probably have to get to work,” Wilde said, and Grizzop nodded. 

“We’ve got a few appointments today, yeah,” he said. “But if you’re free after I can take you to see Artemis. She works late. Most nights.”

“She’s your old boss,” Wilde said.

Grizzop nodded. “She’s good people. Well. Most of the time. And she knows this stuff better than I do. Really I was just the…”

Wilde smirked as he tried to settle on the right word. “...muscle?” 

_ You’re so fast, and so sharp, you could cut me with your gaze like a knife, you never let it go and it’s glorious, Grizzop, it’s amazing the single mindedness you bring to this. You’ll be the best. Better than I ever was. You’ll take down anyone you set your sights on.  _

He could remember the taste of her skin. 

“Yeah,” he said. “Pretty much.”

To give Wilde credit, he looked skeptical, although that could just have been his resting expression.

“Meet you after work then?” Wilde said. “Unless you get bored at lunch.”

His smirk was filthy and Grizzop allowed the heat from it to chase away the memories. “I’m behind as it is, you menace,” he said, but he reached up and pulled Wilde down for a kiss, and Wilde didn’t hesitate or protest, despite the fact that they were in full view of both Landscaping  _ and  _ the Crematorium. 

Maybe he was telling the truth, when he talked about him and Zolf. Maybe it wouldn’t be too much of a complication.

Maybe they could have this.

Grizzop deepened the kiss, even though Wilde had to contort himself stupidly to reach down that far, and grinned against Wilde’s lips when they moved far enough away for Wilde to talk.

“Scandalous, Mr Amsterdam,” Wilde murmured. “What will the neighbours think?”

“Hopefully exactly what they see,” Grizzop said, and pulled back, tweaking Wilde’s cheek as he went. “See you this afternoon.”

Wilde flicked one of his earrings with a fingernail, raised an eyebrow, and nodded. 

Grizzop didn’t watch him as he walked into Wilde Ride. 

He had work to do.


End file.
